(no subject)

[quislibet]

This started out as a reply to this, but then started to get too long.

1. I went to college with a man named Paul who went to Paris for a semester. When he returned, he maintained a London rock star accent (?!) for several months, but mainly around cute chicks. I had a couple of brief conversations with him in which he forgot to turn it on. Once, at a meeting of the local SCA chapter, Paul was impressing newbies with dashing tales of the Pennsic Wars, naturally using his accent. I turned to Doug, a closer friend of Paul than I, and expressed my exasperation at the accent. "Well," said Doug, completely serious, "he was in Europe, you know."

2. One of my old roommates when I lived near Central Square years ago had a close friend who came to visit us after a year in Spain -- our apartment was, in fact, her first stateside location in which to decompress. Parents of another roommate (a fellow Ohioan) were also visiting, and inquired politely where she had been in Spain. "Se-VEE-yeh," she said, and was perhaps perplexed that they had never heard of this famous city, like, you know, in the opera.


I don't know if I was a jerk when I got back from Greece or not. I'd like to think I wasn't; but if I was it was mainly only my family that suffered. It probably would not have occurred to me, however, to tell everyone that I had been living in Athina.(*)


(*) I did run into my old music teacher from high school the summer I got back. (**) I told her I had been in Greece. "What part?" she said. "Athens," I replied. That's when we realized we were having different conversations. She had expected me to reply Danny or Kenickie or Roger or something.


(**) I had to work at Wendy's that summer. Two of my co-workers, on different occasions, asked what language they spoke in Greece. "Greek," I replied. One woman was surprised. "I thought they spoke French!"

The other co-worker asked me "if you could understand it."
"If you speak it, you can," I said.
"Well, I mean, like, people from Australia, you can't hardly understand them when they're talking."
"No... it's a different language."
"Okay, how do you say 'hi' in Greek?"
"Yeia sou."
"Oh," he said. "So it's not like English at all!"

Comments

[clayrobeson.livejournal.com]

It confounds me as to how it's possible for people like (**) to remember to breathe.

[atalanta.livejournal.com]

I want to say I don't believe you, but I do.

[quislibet.livejournal.com]

Yeah. I don't want to believe it myself, really.

Still don't know where that one chickie got the idea they spoke French, though.

[damiel.livejournal.com]

When I came back from Germany, I found myself saying things like Vat iz zeez zing, vat do you call it in Amerika, but chicks never fell for it, so I dropped it.

[rojagato.livejournal.com]

With the German men's reputation, it probably wasn't a matter of not falling for it as much as it was aversion.

[mbayard.livejournal.com]

"Se-VEE-yeh," she said, and was perhaps perplexed that they had never heard of this famous city

oh, i get that sort of silliness all the time from French people. like the visiting researcher who told me he was from "shyom-PON-yah." oh, okay, i'm sure that's a nice place, wherever it is. "SHYOM-*PON*-YA!?!! Dyom Peree-NYONE?!?? Mow-AY AY shyon-DUH?!??? Voov Klee-KOH?!??"

he was from Champagne. silly Frenchman. ;-P

"Oh," he said. "So it's not like English at all!"

thanks. keep telling me stories like that, and i wont miss New Orleans at all. :-/

[tk7602.livejournal.com]

. I went to college with a man named Paul who went to Paris for a semester. When he returned, he maintained a London rock star accent (?!) for several months, but mainly around cute chicks. I had a couple of brief conversations with him in which he forgot to turn it on. Once, at a meeting of the local SCA chapter, Paul was impressing newbies with dashing tales of the Pennsic Wars, naturally using his accent. I turned to Doug, a closer friend of Paul than I, and expressed my exasperation at the accent. "Well," said Doug, completely serious, "he was in Europe, you know."

it is somewhat contagious though... i've worked for a company based in brittain for over 2.5 years now. i've found that i unconsciously insert "u" in very un-american places (colour, flavour), use dodgy (that's a dodgy bit of code), etc. i've not taken to saying "cheers" every 3 seconds, so at least that's ok.

but i say them all with an american flavour

[quislibet.livejournal.com]

Oh, sure, the accent is very contagious, for me at least. But not so much that I would pick it up from the next country down and then hold on to it for several months back in Ohio...

Even if he hung 'round with only Brit ex-pats, it's a curious thing.