37.2 About Ford Perfect
Ford Prefect's original name is only pronuncible in an obscure Betel-
geusian dialect, now virtually extinct since the Great Collapsing Hrung
Disaster of Gal./Sid./Year 03758 which wiped out all the old Praxibetel
communities on Betelgeuse Seven. Ford's father was the only man on
the entire planet to survive the Great Collapsing Hrung disaster, by
an extraordinary coincidence that he was never able satisfactorily to
explain. The whole episode is shrouded in deep mystery: in fact no one
ever knew what a Hrung was nor why it had chosen to collapse on Betel-
geuse Seven particularly. Ford's father, magnanimously waving aside the
clouds of su****ion that had inevitably settled around him, came to live
on Betelgeuse Five where he both fathered and uncled Ford; in memory
of his now dead race he christened him in the ancient Praxibetel tongue.
Because Ford never learned to say his original name, his father even-
tually died of shame, which is still a terminal disease in some parts of
the Galaxy. The other kids at school nicknamed him Ix, which in the
language of Betelgeuse Five translates as "boy who is not able satisfac-
torily to explain what a Hrung is, nor why it should choose to collapse
on Betelgeuse Seven".