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>>Almost no people change their last names here in Argentina. But I don't see a point to that. How many times people pronounced or wrote your last name incorrectly.
>[snip]
>
>My last name is a story indeed. My father is Portugese-Jewish. The original name is De Valença. In 1806 it was changed to Valensa. In the seventies my father asked our queen to restore the original name, which was granted. But some of my brothers and my sister were already over 16 years and they wanted to keep it Valensa. So, now we are divided. There is also an American branch (who emigrated in the 19th century) named Valencia. There are days that I have to correct people several times. I somehow regret that my father asked for restoration. Valensa is much easier in the Netherlands.

Well, you know that most people in English-speaking countries can't write neither Valença or Salías with the proper characters, but anyway I like my last name as it is. I have good friends called Rodríguez (like Smith in the USA) whose names are very usual, but then they are many times confused with other people with the same name, so no name is perfect, except we call me 20-18390658-4 (which is my fiscal id here). ;-)

Regards,