Top Ten Lists- People with Long, Difficult Names (Males)

Here is an arbitrary list of famous or relatively famous people with long, difficult names. Since my name is Tilly Gokbudak, each of them has my full sympathy! A random top ten list of women with long names will be on our other blog "Politics, Culture and Other Wastes of Time."

1. Apichatpong "Joe" Weerasethakul_ (pictured) Whew! We almost didn't spell this one right. But, I suspect many people would have this problem. The 40-year-old Thai director is known around the world by cineastes for his eccentric, off-beat 'small movies' like "Tropical Malady."

2. Siva Vaidyanathan_ This American author of Indian heritage (b.1966) is a media scholar and author. He teaches at the University of Virginia and his current book is "The Googlization of Everything." Yes, we are double-checking his name. It appears to be spelled right!

3. Eugeny Viktrorovich Pluashenko. This 28-year-old Russian figure skater won Olympic gold at the 2006 Turin Olympics.

4. Gebre Gebremariam. An Ethiopian long-distance runner who finished third in last week's Boston Marathon; he also won the 2010 New York Marathon.

5. Zach Galifianakis_ Famous Greek-American actor from Wikesboro, NC, who was in "The Hangover" and "Due Date." His father was a member of Congress.

6. Matti Hautamaki_ This 29-year-old Finnish ski-jumper won silver medals at the 2002 Salt Lake City Olympics and at the 2006 Turin Olympics.

7. Naim Suleymanoglu_ This 44-year-old former Turkish weight-lifter actually defected from then-communist Bulgaria. He went on to win Olympic gold at the 1988 Seoul Olympics. Also known as the 'Pocket Hercules,' Suleymanoglu has alas suffered major health problems in recent years.

8. Rod Blagojevich. This disgraced former Illinois governor is one of the very few Democrats I would never vote for.

9. Volker Schlondorff. He is a legendary German film director best known for cinematic version of "The Tin Drum" (Germany, 1979.)

10. Ross Bagdasarian Jr. This Armenian-American is continuing his late father's legacy as the voice of "Alvin and the Chipmunks."

We hope we got all their names right!