First Name and Last name is misplaced in EP

[Mad Scientist]

Nur in Arabic is Ray of Light

So if a Muslim person name is Nur Hidayah which means literally A person that gives advise like a ray of light. The Nur or Noh or Abdul (Abd) or Mohd (shortform of Muhammad) is the person name itself like Mohd Amin bin Abdullah which mean Mohd Amin is the son of Abdullah
In Arabic will be Mohd Amin Ibnu Abdullah or Abi Abdullah
Same goes to woman binti in Malay or ibni in Arabic

If you go to Mecca to perform the pilgrimage , all the people there are call Haj or Hajjah as it is easier this way as there will be about 2 to 3 million people at one congregation. So the security people will call "Haji !! or Hajjah !! just to get their attention to direct human traffic)
There is a misconception that once you return after the pilgrimage you are bestowed that title Haji or Hajjah
In Arabic Haji means a male performing the Haj
Or Hajjah means a female performing the Haj. That is all
Hence the correlation between the performing of Haj and bestowing the title is totally wrong and misplaced
Same goes to Sh which mean Sheikh or Sharifah which literally means a male teacher or a female teacher
But in East Asia placing this SH. means you are from Arab descendant which is totally wrong literally to the words in Arabic
In Indoneisa we use three name too.
e.g. Hadi Kusuma Magdalene which is the last is the family name . the first is the inaugurated name and the centre is the common name similar to Christians
But some do away with this with just two name . Family and your name like some people in Hong Kong

[Modery]

Mine is also SURNAME FIRSTNAME MIDDLENAME. Sometimes a bit confusing when people call me Mr. MIDDLENAME or just SURNAME, but I didn't have any problems with it at all otherwise

[richie303]

Mine is also SURNAME FIRSTNAME MIDDLENAME. Sometimes a bit confusing when people call me Mr. MIDDLENAME or just SURNAME, but I didn't have any problems with it at all otherwise

Same same. I get called Mr Firstname, Mr Middlename, Mr Surname, and I also get addressed by all three names as if they were my firstname! I was quite sensitive about it to start with, but now, I don't even bother correcting people, unless they get my name completely wrong and call me something else entirely (other than Ang Moh, I get that from time to time)!

[ausinsg]

As Therat pointed out the traditional breakdown of a chinese name is
<family> <generation> <individuals> name.

A family's patriarch would go to the temple and they would prepare a scroll for the family with the sequence of generation names. All children in a generation would have the same generation name.

The couple of friends I know whose family have a scroll, say theirs have about 20 generational names on the scroll.

Quite an interesting piece of history.

[sundaymorningstaple]

Like other have pointed out, I been called by all three of my names. I've also been called Ang Mo affectionately and derogatorily. I could care less. Call me anything you want, just don't call me late for dinner!

[Asdracles]

To make it more complicated, we Spanish don't have a middle name but 2 surnames. So it's GIVEN NAME + 1st FATHER's SURNAME + 1st MOTHER's SURNAME

I have seen all them in all possible orders in official documents. People has called me in all possible ways too, and never had a problem in the airport / EP or whatever, as far as the 3 words are there.

It's only a waste of time each time that some official asks me about this and I have to go to the whole story again... Next time I will just record a voice note in my phone, so I only need to click a couple of buttons....

[therat]

That's not really complicated at all.

Local Chinese has a choice to put their hanyupinyin on their NRIC, birth cerf and passport.

My friend name show in passport has 3 line
1st line. Surname + given name , Anglican
2nd line, Hanyupinyin version of Surname + given name
3rd line, her Chinese name in Chinese character

She told me, once she went thru' Hong Kong custom.
The custom officer ask her.. why her name so long and many lines.
Her reply
1st line, father gave the name
2nd line, government gave the name
3rd line, grandmother gave the name

LOL

[Asdracles]

I'm a gentleman, and I can admit a clear defeat as this one! My case is very simple!!

[beppi]

Many Indonesians have only one name.
They get into many buerocratic problems when travelling or moving abroad, so most give themselves a "family" name before leaving. Apparently it's easy to get the related paperwork showing this new name in Indonesia.