I just love pronouncing those names, though I’ve been unable to work them all in to one logical sentence.
Which names do you just love to pronounce? Lajoie is cool because it gets pronounced differently depending on how frenchy, or how merkin, you want to be. “La ZWAH,” or “La Joe Way,” or “Lazhawee,” or “La Joey,” it’s all good.
Houshmanzadah, Lajoie, Sotomayor, and Achmadinijad…
…walk into a bar
I love the name of Tashkent cyclist Djamolidine Abdoujaparov
Johanna Sigurðardottir.
My husband occasionally travels on business to Baton Rouge. I always repeat the name like the wedding planner guy from Father of the Bride would do (while husband rolls his eyes).
Last week I had a Houshmanzadah and, Sotomayor, it turned so Lajoie that I had to get my Achmadinijad. Oy!
Boutros Boutros Ghali - I love these stuttery type names - Somebody Somebodyson!
Buon estente! Boutros Boutros Ghali! Chr-eeee-s Waddle! Eth eth eth eth eth eth… Scorchio!
Boutros is Arabic for Peter. Ghali means Pumpkineater I think…?
Yeah, the secretaries general of the United Nations have it goin’ on. Boutros Boutros-Ghali there was Javier Pérez de Cuéllar – another great one – and some time before that, to balance it out, there was Thant. Just Thant. So they usually called him U Thant which I understand is basically just the equivalent of “Mr. Thant.”
Dag Hammarskjöld is pretty good, too. You know things are interesting when your head dude is an elegant, cultured diplomat with a Viking-ass name that translates as “Day Hammershield.” You don’t know whether to make tea or run for your life.
("… Jeff-Jeff-Jeff Smith-Smith!")
Oh, let me add another politico whose name rolls off the tongue: Judy Wasylycia-Leis (former NDP MP, now candidate for mayor of Winnipeg).
It’s not all that exotic, but I used to love to say “Alejandro Peña” back when he was playing baseball. Later I found out I had a great aunt named Alessandra, which is sort of similar.
My former husband used to love to say “Oksana Baiul.” I think he still blurts it out frequently, if my children are to be believed.
The name originated when the Arabs borrowed Gothic architecture, with its ogive windows and vaults, from the West. They took one look at the soaring clerestories, with their flying Boutroses, and exclaimed, “Good Ghali!”
I like this one because it contains the last names of three of the greatest bsaeball players of the 1960s, Julian Javier, Tony Perez, and Mike Cuellar. I’m especailly fond of Julian Javier, because at the age of 8, I read his name off a baseball card as “Joolian Jay-vier” which amused my older cousin no end. Having learned the rule about pronouncing "J"s correctly, I then applied it to pitcher Joey Jay.
Until I actually made the substitutions in my head, I was taking you seriously.
I used to like saying the old-time hockey player Yvan Cournoyer (Ee-van Corn-Y-A). But, I can’t remember the last time I had occasion to say his name.