Re: OT: Worcestershire sauce

On Mon, 6 Oct 2003, Mark J. Reed wrote:

> On Mon, Oct 06, 2003 at 05:39:11AM -0400, Tristan McLeay wrote:
> > Are you any more amenable to /'g&ra:dZ/?
>
> Nah.  That just sounds like you can't make up your mind between the
> American and British pronunciations. ;-)
Hey, I'm an Australian. Isn't that what it means to be Australian?

> > I've never actually heard it, but
> > <http://www.aussieinamerica.com/language/herbs.htm>, where I first
> > discovered the American pronunciation of 'fillet', suggests that we would
> > say something more Frenchy. I'd probably say something like
> > /fI,lemI'njOn/, but I wouldn't be surprised if the normal pronunciation of
> > the -e- was /&i/. The -n- is definitely in the same syllable as the -j-,
> > though :)
>
> Syllabification, schmillabification. :)
Well, it wouldn't surprise me if it differed here and there. Americans and
their nooz an ohll...

> Anyway, I'm pretty sure that if you walked into your friendly neighborhood
> Outback steakhouse here in the US and ordered a "Victoria's ['fIl@t]",
> your server would laugh at you.  Not to your face, of course; that would
> be rude.  She would smile, take your order, and go back to the kitchen
> to mock you, probably simply by repeating your order verbatim when placing
> it with the cook.
I'm sure she would, but I'll have the last laugh when I walk off without
tipping her (because when someone goes to a foreign country, they get to
behave like they do in their own, right? Isn't that what American tourists
have been teaching us?). Either that or I could put on my best horribly
fake American accent and ask for a 'Victahreerrzh Filee' (which is *very*
fake, and no-one here would doubt that any less than anyone there).

> Then again, perhaps their extensive employee training in all things
> Australian includes such things as the proper native pronunciation of
> such words . . . :)
Yes, well my understanding is that the Outback Steakhouse is about as
Australian as George Bush (apparently the Outback Steakhouse in Sydney had
its menu translated...).

--
Tristan                  <kesuari@...>

Yesterday I was a dog. Today I'm a dog. Tomorrow I'll probably still
be a dog. Sigh! There's so little hope for advancement.
                -- Snoopy

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