Last year I was fortunate enough to be able to visit Montreal and Quebec for a week or so. I do not speak French, nor did anyone I went on the trip with, but I can do a passable French accent - or should I say, haccennt. We rented a van, stayed downtown and had a great time. Both Montreal and Quebec were very nice and the people friendly regardless of what some had said before we went.
Despite not having two words of French to spin together I did find myself speaking in a silly French haccennt and wondering if this was ow Jean Chretien feel wen e af to speak the hinglish.
It got so bad that at one point I found I was speaking this way to the waiters in the restaurant. I guess it was like some of those characters you see in movies from time to time where they are in a foreign country like France or Italy, and can't speak the language. They either try to speak with a silly French or Italian accent or they speak English only louder thinking that will help the waiter understand better.
It's like shouting when you are introduced to a blind person, it makes absolutely no sense.
On the weekend I phoned one of my sisters, the older one, I won't mention her name here as it might give her a big head. I can just hear her, "Ah Jaysus, me name was in the paper, me name was in the bleedin paper."
Anyway, while talking to my sister she said that she got together with our younger sister last week and after several alcoholic beverages they decided to go to The Citizen website and read some of my previous columns. After throwing their arms around their heads trying to figure out how to pull hair from their ears and laughing so hard they may possibly have wet themselves, they started reading one of the columns in a southern U.S. draaaaawl. Don't ask me why. They were drunk and they are related to me. That should be enough of an explanation.
Then I remembered that on occasion I have read articles in a different accent. I have no idea why. Maybe someone in the story is Italian and I start to read the rest of the story with an Italian accent. I have also done this in an eastern European accent (after all, they all sound pretty much the same), a Scottish accent and pretty much any other accent I think I can do. I believe I also read an article like Austin "Danger" Powers, although this sort of thing ain't normally my bag, baby.
My sister also mentioned that they tried to leave a comment on the website at the end of the column written in the same drunken southern draaaaawl they had been reading the column with.
Fortunately they were unable to leave a comment, but I couldn't help wonder what it would have looked like especially as they would have spelled it phonetically to show it was supposed to be a southern draaaaawl.
"Hii Mick, we weyar readin yoh prettylittlecolumn and thoooought we wooould leave a comment r two for y'aall. I just loooove crows. Theyir my favrit kind of buud that's black and I just loooove how they use theyir beaks to bang and bash alll those prettylittlepeanuts out theyir nasty shells at six in the monin when yoh cuddled up in yoh little sleepin bed. I also looooove that miihtyfine cereal y'aall call Cheerios (although we call them roundie brekfast things in my neck of the woods) and the mashmallow bits them boyz waz firin at y'aall are just delectable in my chilled lemnade on a sunny aftanoon. I have to go now cos it's tiime to take the little uns to thyir beauty pageant contest. I just loooove how dose little princesses look in theyir tiny tiaras. By y'aall."
So try it. Pick an accent and try reading a story. Doesn't matter if you are good at the accent or crap like me. It adds a whole different dimension to it and it might just brighten your day a little, especially if you already have a few alcoholic beverages in you.
