“I’m getting rid of my name,” said Karaca Satılmış, an actor from Istanbul. “It has held me back professionally.”

Satılmış means “sold”, and, to Turkish speakers, it is very amusing. The 35-year-old doesn’t understand why his grandfather chose it.

In Turkey, many people only took on surnames in 1934 as part of “Turkicisation” reforms designed to create a unified nation state. Citizens were formally required to adopt last names, and many chose names that now seem ridiculous, such as Testicle, Jackal and Naked.

But at the end of last year, Turks were pleasantly surprised by a government announcement that in a one-off window in 2018 the civil registry would cut red tape to make it easier for people to change misspelled or embarrassing names.

Since January, more than 105,000 people have applied to get rid of names their ancestors chose that future generations went on to find inappropriate. As the end of the year approaches, the interior ministry says applications are flying in.

While the founder of the Turkish Republic, Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, was gifted his last name – “father of the Turks” – by parliament, not all of his countrymen took the opportunity to give themselves such noble monikers.

Like Satılmış’ grandfather, other people with a sense of humour called themselves everything from animal names to Aptal (stupid), Donsuz (no underwear) and Tasak (testicle).

Generations later, the trend persists. Rahmi is a name derived from the word for “merciful” but can also mean “womb”, meaning a prominent cleric in Istanbul today, Prof Rahmi Yaran, is jokily referred to as “Womb Slasher”.

I won’t miss my old name Karaca Satılmış, actor from Istanbul

In the same city you can can also employ the services of a lawyer called Güven Kurtul. Güven means “trust”, while his surname means “to get rid of”.

Changing a name in Turkey or even rectifying a birth certificate used to involve lengthy and expensive court procedures, but in the window that will close next year, the interior ministry is allowing people to apply directly to local civil registry offices instead.

A total of 30,344 people have applied to change their first name, usually to correct misspellings – amending the woman’s name “Rabiye” to “Rabia” is the most popular request, followed by the male name “Ümit”, alternatively spelled “Ümüt”.

The majority of requests – 75,248 to date – are to change odd family names.

Satılmış (sold), along with Koyun (sheep), Çakal (jackal) and Deli (crazy), are the most common surnames to go, although requests have also been made to get rid of Çıplak (naked), Dana (calf), Kör (blind) and Ördek (duck).

Satılmış is paying the civil registry office a visit on Friday. He has decided his new name will be Gokdeniz – which poetically translates as “sky sea”.

No one else in his family is changing their name, he said, but they understand his decision. “I won’t miss my old name,” he said. “I would never give my own children a name like that.”

Additional reporting by Gokce Saracoglu