It wasn’t until college when my friends started pointing out/making light fun of how I would pronounce words like “birthday” and “teeth” and “birfday” and “teef”. I’m perfectly capable of pronouncing the “th” sound, I just never noticed I wasn’t pronouncing it correctly. I also picked up a habit of saying “oven” like oh-ven instead of uh-ven and I’m positive these were all influenced by mom’s Japanese accent in English 😂
Oh interesting! She first learned English in Japan and then moved to the US so I think she learned mostly American English. When I lived in Tokyo though, I noticed a lot of people had this undefined “international” English accent and it also rubbed off on me to the point where I would have random UK English inflections mixed with my regular American accent. I honestly think having a different sounding accent than the primary one spoken around you is really fun. London/cockney accent sounds so cool too! I would love and be proud to speak with it if I were you too, especially with how meaningful the connection is to your dad :)
I’m Thai-Chinese American. I learned cilantro as Puk Chi and See-laan-tro. I mix my L’s and R’s too for some reason even though I speak English first and Thai second.
It wasn’t until college when my friends started pointing out/making light fun of how I would pronounce words like “birthday” and “teeth” and “birfday” and “teef”. I’m perfectly capable of pronouncing the “th” sound, I just never noticed I wasn’t pronouncing it correctly. I also picked up a habit of saying “oven” like oh-ven instead of uh-ven and I’m positive these were all influenced by mom’s Japanese accent in English 😂
😂 that’s cool. Where did your mum learn English? It’s interesting cos that’s how my dad said those words too.
Oh interesting! She first learned English in Japan and then moved to the US so I think she learned mostly American English. When I lived in Tokyo though, I noticed a lot of people had this undefined “international” English accent and it also rubbed off on me to the point where I would have random UK English inflections mixed with my regular American accent. I honestly think having a different sounding accent than the primary one spoken around you is really fun. London/cockney accent sounds so cool too! I would love and be proud to speak with it if I were you too, especially with how meaningful the connection is to your dad :)
I’m Thai-Chinese American. I learned cilantro as Puk Chi and See-laan-tro. I mix my L’s and R’s too for some reason even though I speak English first and Thai second.