Q as in Cuba

[ESquared]

I once had a boss who liked to occasionally say, "Q as in Cuba."

Let's work up the whole alphabet, choosing common and interesting words. Here are a few... we can probably come up with some better ones.

A - edelweiss
G - jeepers
L - element
M - empirical
N - entropy
O - aubergine

I think it's key to say the whole name of the letter, and not just get the sound in there. For example, I thought of "J as in gerbil" but gerbil starts with /jer/, not /jay/. But maybe there will be a few letters that we can't think of these words for and we'll have to just be content with the sound.

 

[ESquared]

D - Tao

Unfortunately, many people pronounce this incorrectly, so it's considered correct to say it incorrectly. And also unfortunately, it has a homophone of DOW as in industrial average.

But maybe this will spur some ideas in someone.

 

[chipperMDW]

Since we don't have an exact J yet:

J as in gaol.

 

[tsdragon]

J as in gaol

I must have been pronouncing "gaol" wrong all these years!

(And I sure wish I could come up with an appropriate gAOL pun here. Tim! Where are you?)


Tracy Dryden

Meddle not in the affairs of dragons,
For you are crunchy, and good with mustard.

 

[BocaBurger]

Tao & Dao have different sounds, depending on the dialect you are speaking. There are even regional differences in Mandarin. I can now tell a Beijing native from a Taiwanese with ease. In reality, the sound is about 1/2 way between D & T. Zhou is somewhere near "joe" djoe" "tsoe" and "zhoe". You also have to get the tones right or you wind up calling Mr. Zhou, Mr. elbow, or worse yet, Mr. stinky. If you have ever had General Zhou's chicken, you are in the right restaurant.

Now, add this to the fact that my wife's English teacher was from Poland...




BocaBurger
<===========================||////////////////|0
The pen is mightier than the sword, but the sword hurts more!

 

[ESquared]

Thanks for the info, BocaBurger.

chipperMDW, gaol works when printed, but it doesn't work when spoken, because of the homophone jail. But good one anyway.