"Bellfalasch"

Every now and then I get the question, what is "bellfalasch", when I try to give people my email.

The name “Bellfalasch” has an interesting origin story that dates back to my early pen and paper role playing days. When I was around 13 or 14, I played a lot of Mutant Chronicles. I was both a game master and a player, and sometimes wrote and designed my own adventures. And yes, I also played a lot of Doomtrooper (I sometimes still do when meeting old friends).

In one campaign, I played a wealthy Bauhaus general who gradually became a Nepharite warlord. The transformation took many gaming sessions. I drew my characters too, so I redesigned the general as a Nepharite, adding horns and weapons. He needed a suitably scary name to match the Dark Legion.

The Dark Legion manuals were full of guns and weapons. One was a kind of machine gun called Belzarach, and I decided to twist that name into something new. At first I wanted to change the “Bel” part, but in the end I kept it, but as "Bell". I wanted something different than the "f"-sound, and a more hissing "sch"-sound at the end. “Bellfalasch” was born.

This was before the internet became part of everyday life. Later, when I needed a unique username, I tried “Bellfalasch” after many variations of other names. It turned out to be so unusual that it was always available. I started using it as my first option, and eventually it spread all over the internet.

Over the last ten years, I have gradually tried to replace it. It is hard for other people to pronounce, it often needs an explanation, and typos are common. Still, the name remains close to my heart.