Any Scots in the Coachella Valley?

[SF Jeff]

I meant to reply to your post a wee while ago, but somehow, as it does, life has got in the way. Anyhow, to my ear your idea of British accents with words are not anywhere near how my ear receives them or, how my tongue pronounces them!

To my UK ear. Ballet(the dance) is pronounced as BALLAY. Buffet is pronounced BUFFAY. Garage(where one gets petrol from, or mends the car), is depending where one comes from in the UK, is often , GARAHGE, or, GARRIDGE.There is no emphasis on any of the syllables.

And of course, there is the added complication of the correct British way of spelling some of these words!

We can probably thank William the Conquerer for this. So many French words have the accent on the last syllable, but somewhere along the line the Brits moved it to the first syllable (GAIR-ahj rather than guh-RAHJ) and somewhere else along the line us Americans moved it back. But it's all good. It's what makes life interesting. However... KAHN-trih-byoot still ruffles my feathers, but I'll let others kuhn-TRIB-yoot their thoughts on that.

[Canadian Vet]

We can probably thank William the Conquerer for this. So many French words have the accent on the last syllable, but somewhere along the line the Brits moved it to the first syllable (GAIR-ahj rather than guh-RAHJ) and somewhere else along the line us Americans moved it back. But it's all good. It's what makes life interesting. However... KAHN-trih-byoot still ruffles my feathers, but I'll let others kuhn-TRIB-yoot their thoughts on that.

I grew up in the French part of Canada and learned some French along the way ... certainly pronunciations.
When noticing the name of a town in England I pronounced it in French Beaulieu ... BOW-LEE-yeu. My Londoner brother in law laughed at me and told me it was pronounced BEW-LEE. I believe that I winced as if I'd bitten into a lemon.