This is part of the speech I gave at the launch of When Dining with Tigers.

Why do I write under the name Frank Chan Loh when ordinarily I call myself Frank Loh?

Let me explain. My Chinese name is Chan Kong and my surname Loh. I shortened my Chinese name to Chan because I didn’t want people going around poking fun of my name by calling me King Kong or Hong Kong or Ping Pong. No, that’s not the real reason; I was just kidding.

The real reason was because of a clash of culture: Australian with Chinese. Australians have three names: a first name, a middle name and the family name. Official departments such as the RTA, Telstra, Optus, my bank, the Education Department and the Taxation Office can’t understand why I should have four names: Frank Chan Kong Loh. They think my Chinese name Chan Kong is two names (I should've hyphenated it or write as one word) and having two names as your middle name is, in their opinion, a bit ostentatious and that was why, I suppose, in official letters sent from official departments to me, I am always addressed as Frank Chan Loh. The name doesn’t sound too bad so I decided to use it as my pen name when I began writing.

After I emigrated to Australia in the late 70s, I taught English at my local Adult Migrant Centre once a week in the evenings for a while. Following the Australian practice of informality when it comes to introducing oneself, I encouraged the class to address me by my given name, Frank, instead of by my surname, Loh. In my class was a Greek mechanic called Con with whom I became friends. Later on, I tutored his twin daughters in 4 Unit Mathematics. Like all Greeks—it must be in the Greek culture—Con and his family have a healthy respect for teachers. Because I had been his teacher and because I had tutored his daughters, Con and his family wanted to show me the respect Greeks accord to their teachers by always addressing me as Mister. However, they didn’t know my surname so Con and his family ended up calling me Mr Frank.

When I was writing my novel When Dining with Tigers, I remembered this situation that I had found myself in. I used it as a basis for an incident in the novel where my main character made the acquaintance of a Melbourne couple sitting next to him on the plane from Beijing to Sydney and who had introduced themselves as Tony and Mabel. Since my main character didn’t know the couple’s surname, I made him address them as Mr Tony and Mrs Tony.

Now to come back closer to home. My wife’s family name is Lim. When we came to Australia and she started work as a nursing sister, she used her maiden name. The hospital staff called her Sister Lim but complications arose whenever I visited her workplace. Her colleagues would call me Mr Lim. At first I didn’t mind being called that but after some time, it irritated me to be called Mr Lim. For the sake of women’s equality, I didn’t mind my wife keeping her maiden name. Her colleagues could call her Sister Lim, or for that matter, Mrs Lim, for all they like, but for the sake of men’s equality, I wished they would call me Mr Loh, instead of Mr Lim. Now I know how the husband of Olivia Newton-John must have felt when people called him Mr Newton-John—what’s his name again? Fortunately for me, my wife didn’t kick up a big fuss when I suggested she use her married name at work and now her colleagues call her Sister Loh or Mrs Loh. The change in nomenclature suits me just fine.

My ex-students, even though they’ve walked through the school portal for the last time many years ago, still call me Mr Loh. When When Dining with Tigers was published, I invited one of them to this launch. (I won't embarrass her by identifying her.) She had seen the last of her school-bag four years ago. In her email reply, she still addressed me as Mr Loh.

I emailed back, Now you’re no longer in school and have gone out into the big wide world, you don’t have to call me Mr Loh anymore. Just call me Frank.
She emailed back, Oh, no—I could almost hear her gasp in horror—I can never bring myself to call you Frank. To me, you’ll always be my teacher. I’ll always call you either Mr Loh or Sir.

All right then, let’s strike a compromise, I emailed back, ever the reasonable man that I am, just call me Sir Frank.