We are learning and loving the New Zealand accent. They do remarkable things with vowels.
- We are on a short Jetstar hopper flight from Auckland to Nelson. Suddenly Emily is all excited. The flight attendant had just announced that they had snakes for sale. That is exactly what they said, “We have snakes for sale.” Obviously they were saying “We have snacks for sale,” but they do indeed pronounce snacks as snakes. If Jetstar really did sell snakes during flights, Emily would have more frequent flyer miles with that airline than any other.
- Then it was my turn. We are staying at the Aldamere B&B at Lake Brunner for two nights. William co-manages it and is the host. Very funny, very witty, very sharp, very fast. We had a good time for 2 days there. At one point he and I were talking about dinner plans for the next night – they do group family-style dinners for anyone interested. After that he said, “Do you want fish tails?” I looked at him very quietly. He begins to grin because something really dumb is going to come out of my mouth and he can’t wait. So I am grinning too and do the dumb straight-guy thing, “Fish Tails?…” I ask? He cracks up and attempts to say “Fresh Towels” in an American accent. This may seem like a stretch, but it isn’t. Fresh is pronounced Fish and Towels sounds like Tails.
