On Apr 6, 6:45 am, CL <flot...@yahoo.com> wrote:
> On 04/05/2011 07:04 PM, Declan Murphy wrote:
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> > On Apr 5, 11:25 am, CL<flot...@yahoo.com>  wrote:
> >> On 04/05/2011 08:37 AM, The 2-Belo wrote:
> >>> We have a report from the fj.life.in-japan Dynamics Officer that Declan Murphy
> >>> has exploded. Flight director confirms that:
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> >>>> On Apr 3, 10:17?am, CL<flot...@yahoo.com>    wrote:
> >>>>> On 04/02/2011 06:32 PM, Declan Murphy wrote:
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> >>>>>> This was kind of difficult. I hadn't been "on video" while on radio
> >>>>>> before. Haven't received any training and lack experience, and
> >>>>>> unfortunately it shows.
> >>>>>>http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uih0zQrryEI
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> >>>>> My daughter wanted to know what language that person was speaking. ?She
> >>>>> has no problem with television British, Irish, or Scots accents as she's
> >>>>> a big Dr. Who, Sarah Jane, and Katy Brand fan, but there was just
> >>>>> something in all of that that kept her language switch from working.
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> >>>> I don't really know what I sound like. Apparently my accent drifts
> >>>> around depending on who I was last speaking to etc. An Italian
> >>>> customer recently interrupted me to say "I studied British in London
> >>>> Mr Murphy, and cannot understand your American accent", which made the
> >>>> American customers in the room break out in laughter.
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> >>> Yeah, this happens to me as well. I spent two weeks in New Hampshire back in
> >>> 2007 for technical training, and about 10 days into it I had called my mother in
> >>> Maryland -- she immediately asked why the hell I was "talking strangely".
> >>> Apparently, I had paaked the caa in the yaad too many times.
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> >> Being born in New England and having two parents who were Bostonians on
> >> a professional level their entire lives, I can slip in and out of that
> >> accent quite without thinking.  But, my regular spoken English is a
> >> combination of New England and Midwestern.  People often ask me what
> >> part of Toronto I grew up in.
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> > So what part of Toronto did you grow up in then?
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> Not Toronto; Hull.  I come from a long line of hockey playing
> accountants and actuaries  ...
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> > Apparently (when speaking English) I have trouble pronouncing the
> > vowel O. Most of my work over the years has been conducted in
> > Japanese, and when I am using English, its mostly to read or write.
> > Unfortunately I don't have any recordings of my voice from before I
> > came to Japan to compare/contrast with.
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> I am reliably told by the expert listeners in my home and the Eigojin at
> her school, that I say my 'o's "'oo,' like a Scotsman" and that my 'ou's
> either sound like "oo" or "au." Many years ago, when I had to consort
> with Mormons in the workplace, I was a constant source of amusement for
> a couple of the Utah natives in the group for my pronunciation of the
> word "room" which a couple of English teachers (real ones in the US, not
> burger flippers resident in Japan) have said said is much closer to the
> Shakespearian "rhuum" than the local varieties.

Do you have any trouble with the other vowels? (that you are aware of
etc?) Apparently I use the Japanese pronunciation of "a" most of the
time. When I say "that", the a is pronounced like it would be in
thar.. star etc.

> Then, of course there's the whole "a" thing, which is more than "ahnt"
> instead of "ant" and I use a whole bunch of British words where an
> American word would have done.  And, now that I've written that, I can't
> think of any examples, as usual ... well, "shan't" instead of "won't" is
> one ...

Why British words btw? Influence of colleagues, customers or media
etc? I think I was always fairly hybrid to start with.