A Scania in L.A.
Towards the end of the 1980s, Scania found relief from being compared to her namesake: “I moved to Los Angeles and worked for a celebrity lawyer,” she recalls. “Over there, everyone seemed to have an unusual name - they’re called things like Summer, you know – and I didn’t feel at all out of place. In fact, in all the time I spent there, only one person ever commented on my name. And he was an out-and-out truck enthusiast who would always tell me what a wonderful vehicle a Scania was. He used to make me feel quite proud!”
After 18 months, a major Californian earthquake persuaded Scania it was time to leave the States. “It was six-point-something on the Richter scale, too much for me, so I headed back home,” she says. “Before long, I had met and married Owain, a teacher in Cardigan, and went to live in the sticks – in a tiny place by the coast where I’m definitely the only Scania in the village!
The name was well known by then as I remember Owain’s mother saying to me when we met, ‘Is it spelt like the lorry; S-C-A-N-I-A?’
“Today, I’ve got two children of my own, Hari aged nine and Ella who’s six. When they were small, I used to spend a lot of time on the computer – after all there’s not much else to do where we live; we don’t even have a village shop! One day I visited the Scania website and found a screensaver with my name on, which I thought was brilliant! After I had downloaded it, I decided to send the company an email with the heading: A girl called Scania. I told them my story but what I really wanted to find out was whether there was somewhere in Sweden called Scania.
“When the reply came, it was from a gentleman called Conny Hetting, the Editor of Scania World magazine. He told me it is indeed true and that Scania is the Latin name for Skåne, a province in the south of the country where the original Scania company was based. Whether my mother knew that at the time…well, who knows?
“A while later Conny phoned me and asked if he could interview me for a story for his magazine. I was flattered – and even more so now as I understand the article has been reprinted in a number of countries around the world as far away as Russia and Thailand.
“When I met Conny it made me jump a bit to hear him say my name. After all, I have absolutely no connection whatsoever with the world of transport and had never met anyone familiar with the word ‘Scania’ before. That was completely new to me. But I soon got used to it and, I have to say, ended up quite liking it.
“In fact, having an unusual name does have its advantages. Today, I work in PR for a firm which makes clothing for skateboarders and mountain bikers. I have to talk to fashion journalists on all the major magazines and having a memorable name really does help – after all, no-one’s going to forget someone who shares her name with the Truck of the Year!”
