Divided By A Common Tongue

You’d assume that if the customer, the builders merchant, and the builder all spoke English communication would be straightforward. Not the case, if the customer is English, the builders merchant Scottish and the builder Northern Irish. Take the following for an example. Around the edge of our roof there is a metal duct that carries rainwater off the roof and towards the drain, which needed to be replaced. To the customer (me, English) these are “gutters” (pronounced ghu-ttars), to the builders merchant (Scottish) they are “rhones” (pronounced r-r-roans) but to our builder (Northern Irish) its “spouting” (pronounced spoit’n) you’re after! Its something of a triumph of international relations that the stuff was bought and fixed successfully at all.

Our family consists of an English husband, a N. Irish wife and their three Scottish children (Boris, Norris and Doris, no less). There’s every possibility that none of us have ever correctly understood anything said to us at home.