Yeah shit, sorry, that was supposed to be the surrounding page rather than a direct link to the download.
Me too.
I never really thought about it one way or another. I just figured they grew on some form of planty thing, I don’t understand why discovering the particular configuration of the planty thing they grow on is so cerebellum-wrenching for some of you.
I know very little about the history of the Vietnam war. In movies I kept hearing about Ho Chi Min, and for some reason I assumed for years they were talking about a person. I only realized a couple of years ago that it’s actually a city. :smack:
Umm, it was a person. The city was named after him.
Ho Chi Minh was the leader of North Viet Nam. He died during the middle of the war(1969). You may have heard of Saigon? Doesn’t exist anymore. It became Ho Chi Minh City after the war was over.
Until I was 38, I thought the Greek lamb dish, the gyro, was pronounced like gyroscope.
Then I found out it is pronounced gear-o.
But, I grew up in NYC - it’s possible they do usually pronounce it JY-ro.
INRS, I once had a Greek restaurant sell me gyros and call it shwarma, so don’t feel bad.
(I did, though. I was pissed.)
I always heard the Greek “gyro” pronounced CHEE-ro, with the first syllable like the end of the German “Ach,” as if you’re clearing your throat.
Well, shit.
The other day, a friend and I were driving around and saw a greek food resturaunt with a sign that said “fresh GYROS!” or something like that. My friend was like, “what the hell is a Gyro(Jy-ro)?” To which I replied,
“Some sandwich thing. It’s pronounced hero, by the way.” :smack:
I’ve always heard it pronounced as “year-oh”.
That’s the way I’ve always heard it pronounced, too.
Maybe they called them shwarmas because they couldn’t pronounce gyros.
Don’t EVEN ask me how I used to think the name “Hermione” was pronounced.
I didn’t actually give much thought to how Hermione should be said until I got to the point in Goblet of Fire where Viktor Krum is mispronouncing it.
I’ve always wondered about this one too so I asked a friend in Greece about Yiros/Gyros. He said Yiros was correct so I don’t know where Gyro spelling comes from. I’ve only heard them pronounced as year-ohs too.
None of them are wrong. Its a regional thing.
And shwarma is the Lebanese name for a similar food.
Shwarma isn’t just Lebanese; I learned it as a Hebrew word in Israel, where it’s almost as popular as falafel and much more popular than gyros.
Sort of. “Shwarma” is not Hebrew – it’s clearly a loan-word from Arabic, nobody thinks it’s originally Hebrew.
I did just now learn that it is a loan from the Lebanese (rather than local Palestinian) dialect.
There is no such word as “gyros” (any pronunciation) in Hebrew.
In any case, for reasons of “Kashrut,” Shwarma is (sacrilegiously IMO) served with humus and tehina rather than with yogurt… 
But that’s a whole 'nother rant.
Re: John vs. Jonathan - I suspect there’s a religious/cultural element in play here, with “John” being more common among Christians, while “Jonathan” is more typically Jewish. Just to be anecdotal, I know plenty of Jonathans (including my father), but few Johns, and none of the latter were Jews.