You Say Potato, I Say Pickle
Hit a phonetic wall this morning.
Bitten by a puzzle idea, I’ve spent the last while converting people like Harry Kewell and Kelly Slater into hair-reek-yule and care-lease-later respectively.
Some names, like songwriter Joe Camilleri, are ripe for the mangling. I mean joke-camel-leery almost sounds like a Page 3 headline.
But most other names defy the treatment. (Men like Christopher are generally safe, while you can forget about Naomi.) And then you hit a name like Kevin Rudd’s wife - Therese Rein. Ooh, yes. Those letters. A potential candidate - but how is she pronounced?
In sound, does her name go closest to (a) trees-rain, (b) trays-rain, (c) trees-arraign, (d) trays-arraign or (e) you tell me.
A mate at Radio National scratched her head. Curiously the ABC’s Language Guide can tell you how to twist your tongue around Bosnia-Herzegovina or JM Coetzee, but not the PM’s other half.
I dropped an email to the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade - chewing the phonetic fat with DFAT - and my inside source said try the PM’s office. And of course, that only allows for snail mail, or the chance to join the electronic static about fuel levies and Medibank Private from his constituents.
Meantime I have a homophone puzzle to deliver. So short of taking a wild stab, I’ll leave the matter in the hands of an informed blog guest who cares to set my syllables straight. Altogether, let’s say……..what? Which is it?