Chemiker wrote:

>
> It's my understanding that satay actually derives from English. The
> rationale is this:
>
> English brought beef steak to the indian subcontinent and Indochina.
> Some languages there (Thai?) have a problem with words beginning with
> certain non-vowel sounds, one of which is STxxx. So steak became
> SaTake, which evolved into Sate/Satay.

Interesting. Didn't know that.
>
> I have noticed that native Korean-speakers can have trouble with
> certain English endings. FE: Pharmacy -> Pharmash.

> Not restricted to that part of the world, of course. We all joke about
> the l/r transposition by Japanese, but English speakers have trouble
> getting German right, and Hungarian is a nightmare.

Heh. you should hear me trying to pronounce some Afrikaans words...

> That's because
> both languages have vowel sounds not found in English. Hungarian,
> IIRC, has something like a dozen vowels, all written as a,e,i,o,u, but
> some with diacritical marks. Romance languages revel in terminal
> vowels (fe: Bolero, di Giorno, Toro, Angelo, etc.), and those native
> speakers sometimes retain the terminal vowel at all costs on ENglish
> words that end in consonants. (I'm'a Nice'a Guy!"

Learning to spell English (never mind learning how to pronounce it) must
be a real mission for some, IMHO. After all, it's not the most phonetic
(or should that be 'fonetik'?) language on the planet either, is it?
Take the word 'doubt' or the word 'lamb'. The 'b' is 'silent' in both
cases, but it must confuse the hell out of some people.

Not to mention English grammar; in a lot of other languages the verb is
used at the end of a sentence - but no, not English. Heck, English is
my 'home language' and even I can't always get it right. <sigh>

--
Cheers
Chatty Cathy