We had our second son last week. You would think 9 months of pregnancy would prepare you to name someone. And yet, my husband and I could not agree.

We are both Asian Americans, me from India, he from Laos by way of his parents. Some names were too mainstream and others too niche. I wanted something distinctive, he wanted something that wouldn’t keep the kid from being hired (yes, 20 years from now).

Arabs loved the more obscure of my suggestions; my husband’s Caucasian co-workers balked at those ideas.

Here’s a snapshot of our process and how our El Segundo (the second in Spanish) finally got a name.