There is no country called France ... and other things

[Shadow]

16 minutes ago, gingerjon said:

Chai Tea, as well, I believe?

(I actually don't have an issue - though some do - with this. As it's how loan words are adopted into plenty of languages. Thus panini is actually an English singular and paninis perfectly fine as a plural.) 

To be honest anyone in this country ordering a Panino would be deserving of a slap

[voteronniegibbs]

3 hours ago, Shadow said:

The facts on here are far too interesting to go in the Uninteresting Trivial Facts Thread

 

3 hours ago, gingerjon said:

I'm going to take that as a challenge

The facts themselves may be uninteresting, but surely by the fact that thread achieves readership, makes the thread of interest.

[JonM]

5 hours ago, marklaspalmas said:

Yeah, also not true.

I was told this by a Japanese person, when we were climbing Fuji - so it is believed by at least some Japanese.

[meast]

On 09/03/2021 at 11:22, Mumby Magic said:

Pronunciation of Shrewsbury and Sowerby Bridge still need to be confirmed.

"Shrews-Berry"

"Soby-Bridge"

That's my take anyway.

[gingerjon]

13 minutes ago, Shadow said:

To be honest anyone in this country ordering a Panino would be deserving of a slap

The kind of people who I've heard justify using the word 'panino' in English are absolutely the worst people.

[shaun mc]

6 minutes ago, meast said:

"Shrews-Berry"

"So-woby-Bridge"

That's my take anyway.

When I lived in Shrewsbury, most of the locals pronounced it Shoosbree

[The Hallucinating Goose]

34 minutes ago, shaun mc said:

When I lived in Shrewsbury, most of the locals pronounced it Shoosbree

Why would you put brie in your shoes??

[marklaspalmas]

45 minutes ago, JonM said:

I was told this by a Japanese person, when we were climbing Fuji - so it is believed by at least some Japanese.

Ah fair play Jon, maybe so. I think the honorific application is largely colloquial, almost humourous as San and sama should only be used for people.

As you said, each Kanji has two readings, the kunyomi and the onyomi. If you wanted to specify that Fuji is a mountain, you'd say Fuji yama. Which would be a bit like saying Ben Nevis mountain, not really necessary. So I'm not sure why you'd read san for yama there.

Anyway. How did you find the climb? Hand on heart, I found it a bit boring and a bit of a slog. Plus the fact that inevitably it was cloudy at the top.

[JonM]

18 minutes ago, marklaspalmas said:

Anyway. How did you find the climb? Hand on heart, I found it a bit boring and a bit of a slog. Plus the fact that inevitably it was cloudy at the top.

I'd previously been up Mt. Taranaki in NZ, which a lot of Japanese people do because it looks very similar, and that was much more enjoyable (because it was relatively empty and it was Christmas week and sunny, and the top 100m or so was covered in ice/snow and we had a guide to get us over that part).

Fuji was interesting more because it was a day off after a week at the customer's offices, and because we had some Japanese colleagues showing us round, and we'd got the bullet train, and we'd been to cool temples and gardens in Kyoto, rather than the actual climb. Highlight of the trip was that my boss was trying to get pregnant and in spite of being a Physics PhD, she went to some mumbo-jumbo Japanese temple that supposedly helped with such things. In those less enlightened times, that meant she was the subject of a certain amount of ######-taking.

[Shadow]

9 minutes ago, JonM said:

Highlight of the trip was that my boss was trying to get pregnant and in spite of being a Physics PhD, she went to some mumbo-jumbo Japanese temple that supposedly helped with such things. In those less enlightened times, that meant she was the subject of a certain amount of ######-taking.

I'm reliably informed by a National Trust Ranger that on Midsummers night you can barely move for couples copulating on the Cerne Abbas Giant for the same reason. Has your boss been to Dorset?

[JonM]

Just now, Shadow said:

I'm reliably informed by a National Trust Ranger that on Midsummers night you can barely move for couples copulating on the Cerne Abbas Giant for the same reason. Has your boss been to Dorset?

She had two kids, both are at uni now, so problem solved, but she does still spend a fair amount of time visiting stone circles, standing stones, burial mounds etc. so maybe you're on to something there

[Dr Tim Whatley]

2 hours ago, shaun mc said:

When I lived in Shrewsbury, most of the locals pronounced it Shoosbree

81% of locals agreed with you in a poll a few years back

https://www.shropshirestar.com/news/2015/06/27/shrowsbury-or-shroosbury-the-results-are-in/

I always said 'Shrowsbury' because of an old school teacher (really old; he taught Michael Heseltine) who taught there and pronounced it like that. But I'm not going to argue with such a landslide. Shroo it is.

[JohnM]

Pin number. 

 

[Futtocks]

1 hour ago, Dr Tim Whatley said:

81% of locals agreed with you in a poll a few years back

https://www.shropshirestar.com/news/2015/06/27/shrowsbury-or-shroosbury-the-results-are-in/

I always said 'Shrowsbury' because of an old school teacher (really old; he taught Michael Heseltine) who taught there and pronounced it like that. But I'm not going to argue with such a landslide. Shroo it is.

I remember this being discussed on some Radio 4 show years ago, and when they interviewed the locals, some said "Shroosbury" and some said "Shrowesbury". So in a way, it is very English, in that there is no answer that anybody can claim is 100% correct.

[Futtocks]

3 minutes ago, JohnM said:

Pin number. 

 

[Wiltshire Warrior Dragon]

22 hours ago, Futtocks said:

I remember this being discussed on some Radio 4 show years ago, and when they interviewed the locals, some said "Shroosbury" and some said "Shrowesbury". So in a way, it is very English, in that there is no answer that anybody can claim is 100% correct.

I worked for Craven District Council, based in Skipton, for fourteen years and never really understood whether the first syllable of the South Craven village name 'Cowling' was meant to rhyme with 'foul' or 'foal'!

[Wiltshire Warrior Dragon]

22 hours ago, Futtocks said:

I remember this being discussed on some Radio 4 show years ago, and when they interviewed the locals, some said "Shroosbury" and some said "Shrowesbury". So in a way, it is very English, in that there is no answer that anybody can claim is 100% correct.

i once heard somebody in a butcher's shop in Southwell - Nottinghamshire's little known gem - ask whether it was 'South-well' or 'Suthull'.  "Depends if you're from the posh end of town" came the amusing if not entirely helpful reply from the shopkeeper!  I lived just outside it for about three years and never found a definitive answer!

[gingerjon]

1 hour ago, Wiltshire Warrior Dragon said:

i once heard somebody in a butcher's shop in Southwell - Nottinghamshire's little known gem - ask whether it was 'South-well' or 'Suthull'.  "Depends if you're from the posh end of town" came the amusing if not entirely helpful reply from the shopkeeper!  I lived just outside it for about three years and never found a definitive answer!

The River Nene is pronounced differently depending on which end of Northamptonshire the person talking about it lives in.

[Ullman]

On 07/03/2021 at 15:44, Johnoco said:

Yeah I knew that too! It's something like Dark Pool. Without googling it's something like Dubh means dark or black and Lihn means pool or water. In Gaelic obvs.

If my Thin Lizzy albums taught me anything it's that Róisín Dubh means Black Rose.

[Ullman]

On 10/03/2021 at 12:58, gingerjon said:

The kind of people who I've heard justify using the word 'panino' in English are absolutely the worst people.

As you get to grips with German pronunciation don't ever be that person who insists on pronouncing it correctly when ordering a pint of Löwenbräu in an English pub.

[voteronniegibbs]

2 hours ago, Wiltshire Warrior Dragon said:

i once heard somebody in a butcher's shop in Southwell - Nottinghamshire's little known gem - ask whether it was 'South-well' or 'Suthull'.  "Depends if you're from the posh end of town" came the amusing if not entirely helpful reply from the shopkeeper!  I lived just outside it for about three years and never found a definitive answer!

it's definitely South-well , I know this because a posh lad at the local rugby club tried to correct my pronunciation to Suthull

[Robin Evans]

17 minutes ago, voteronniegibbs said:

it's definitely South-well , I know this because a posh lad at the local rugby club tried to correct my pronunciation to Suthull

Suthull. I got battered there for 78 minutes. I swung one decent punch over in the 79th and got sent off. 

Never got on wi Notts..... 1984 n'all that.

[Robin Evans]

1 hour ago, Ullman said:

If my Thin Lizzy albums taught me anything it's that Róisín Dubh means Black Rose.

The first gig I ever took the memsahib to was lizzy on the black rose tour.... Gary Moore and Scott Goram playing off each other.

Got sod all to do wi this thread like....

[voteronniegibbs]

8 minutes ago, Robin Evans said:

The first gig I ever took the memsahib to was lizzy on the black rose tour.... Gary Moore and Scott Goram playing off each other.

Got sod all to do wi this thread like....

I saw Gary Moore at Donington in '84........ this might have something to do with this thread

[gingerjon]

It is believed by some that the word 'penguin' derives from the Welsh pen-gwyn.

Pen-gwyn means white head.

Penguins do not have white heads.