Umang

Umang comes from outside Europe, carried into Poland by families who met it elsewhere. In Hindi it works as an ordinary word before it works as a name. The word means enthusiasm, a lift of joy, the eagerness you feel at the start of something new. The name takes that word and lets a person wear it.

In India it belongs to boys and girls alike. The name has stayed close to its plain sense, which many older names lose along the way. Someone called Umang answers to a word for gladness.

On a Polish class register it would sit among the Kacpers and Zuzannas, foreign and short. It reads as four letters. A teacher calling the roll would manage it on the first try. Whatever else the name gathers here, the Hindi word underneath still means enthusiasm and joy.