Getting Somthing to Drink in England...
Mala's post on pronunciation made me think of a funny incident:

Last year my wife and I flew to England. We were living in Italy at the time so we were on a European super-discount bargain airline. The crew was English. When they came by offering beverages, my wife asked for water. The flight attendant looked puzzled and then inquired, "Wine?" My wife glanced over at me with a slightly panicked look. "Water," I explained. The flight attendant then smiled and looked relieved, "Of course, water!" And he proceded to pour my wife a glass of water.

What was the problem? It was not that my wife has a speech impediment or did not speak loudly or clearly. The issue was that she was American and pronounced water in a typical American way: with an open a and soft t. Having attended a British school in my youth, I was familiar with the inability for some Brits to understand the Yankee pronunciation and came to the rescue with the *proper* way to say it: wuotter. Of course, had either of us used an *improper* pronounciation, such as a cockney accent (wuo'ah), the flight attendant would have still understood. For it may be improper, but it is still recognizable.

So what is the purpose of speaking? To communicate? To establish one's position in society? To establish one's right to belong to a particular community? And why do certain ways of speaking drive us crazy?

Throughout our trip my wife had a hard time communicating. To her credit, in one instance our waiter was from South Africa and he had a very thick accent. However, I can empathize with her. After my first day of school at the British school, I came home feeling a little lost. When my mother asked me how the day went, all I could say was, "I can't understand a word they are saying!"