My column on Andre
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I like it. My husband and I considered it before we decided not to have kids. My husband was a fan of Andre the Giant and wanted to keep with the French theme since my name is also French.
I've never seen Andre used by black or mixed-race South Africans, but it's widely used by Afrikaans-speaking white parents. English ones stay with Andrew. And I don't know how Americans pronounce it: here, Andrew has a short a as in cat, and Andre has a long a, as in far but without the -r, or the sound doctors are said to elicit when looking down throats: 'say "Aaah!"'. Ahndray, therefore.