we do
we come from lincolnshire and everyone thinks we
are yorkies it doesnt sound the same at all
Pat

When we went to Australia, we did a coach tour from Brisbane up to Cairns. Our fellow travellers were about 50/50 Australians and New Zealanders. The Olympics were on at the time and there was a lot of cheering when new medals were announced, and one day England must have won one - and there were two lone cheers! There was a bit of a stunned silence and then something like "You're not Poms, are you?". Apparently the Ozzies had thought we were Kiwis, and the Kiwis had thought we were Ozzies. No-one had realised we were from England!

On a trip to London a guy on one of the stalls along the South Bank swore that he could place anyones's accent and that he'd never been wrong. He then confidently announced that Mr E was Australian. He's from Plymouth via Portsmouth, never been further south than Kerala. He couldn't place my accent

I am Scottish, and normally everyone assumes I am Irish even though I have never even been there!

Ha Ha slightly but this thread reminds me of a barman we met in Icmeler a few years ago. He couldnt speak much english but he was amazing at accents! We spent hours in that bar testing him on different ones- he could do them all from cornwall right up to Scotland, his brummy was particularly good!

You think you have problems? What about this then;

http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/top-stories/2009/08/12/o-grady-in-us-airport-alien-row-115875-21590712/

Never knew that Fidel Castro and all his fellow countrymen hailed from Liverpool!

fwjh

As a Liverpudlian by birth, I've never been mistaken for a Cuban (well apart from the young Cuban man half my age who assured me that I must be Cuban because I was so beautiful!) but my Dad and I were routinely taken to be Dutch when speaking German on walking holidays in the Austrian Alps. This was extremely confusing in one mountain refuge when, after I placed our food and drink order in German, the German man at the next table started to show off his language skills by trying to start a conversation with us in Dutch! Nor was I sure on another occasion whether it was a compliment or not when my Dad was congratulated on speaking such good German 'for a Netherlander'!

SM

I'm often considered as a Belgian by the French!! (Well when I'm not in Alsace anyway!)

My Belfast accent is sometimes mistaken for a Scottish one (which I take as a great compliment as I love a Scottish accent)

when working around the country many people think I'm a Londoner I'M NOT ..I'm KENTISH through and through...
when in Greece/Cyprus [using my little bit of Greek] I'm usually asked where on Crete or where in Athens I'm from. . I am pleased to be considered for either of these but London NO NO NO

The North East of Scotland has a particularly strong accent and on Coach Tour of Austria where the first pick up was Aberdeen, the English Courier remarked that it was the first time he had Gaelic speakers on his tour. We were a bit puzzled as the pickups had all been on the East Coast and Gaelic Speakers tend to be from the North West or Western Isles. He indicated the family he thought was speaking Gaelic and we had to laugh when we told him that it wasn't Gaelic but 'Peterhead' they were speaking

Even after living in Aberdeen for many years, I still have problems with the Peterhead accent!

I used to work for a higher education college that had campuses in both Dundee and Aberdeen. Most of my teaching was in Dundee but I did teach one particular module that was offered on both campuses so for one term each year I had to go up to Aberdeen one day a week. One day, the taxi driver taking me to Dundee station for the train, knowing from my own accent that I wasn't local, asked me how I was getting on with understanding the local accent (Dundonians are known throughout Scotland for using an awful lot of glottal stops instead of consonants!) and I said that I was now pretty tuned in with the Dundonian accent and dialect and could understand people fine but that I was doing less well with the Aberdonian accent and Doric speech. To which he replied with a perfectly straight face 'Well hen, what you need to understand is that Aberdeen is populated with failed ventroliquists. Even us Scots have trouble making out what they're saying.' So true! I realised immediately that it summed up that very tight lipped way that many in the northeast of Scotland have of talking. Ever since I've never been able to get that image of the 'failed ventriloquists' out of my head when listening to someone with a strong northeastern accent

I don't think anyone's ever got mine wrong - I'm a proper Manc (think Shameless, not Corrie) I have had some people from "darn sarf" not being sure which bit of "oop north" we're from, but then again I can't tell the difference between any Southern accents either - Essex, Kent, Surrey... they all sound the same to me, as I'm sure most Northern accents sound to Southerners

helenc wrote:

we had to laugh when we told him that it wasn't Gaelic but 'Peterhead' they were speaking

Meerkat2505 wrote:

Even after living in Aberdeen for many years, I still have problems with the Peterhead accent!

Fit bit o' Peterheid spik di ye nae understand?
If we speak in broad Doric we're often asked if we're German!

luci

Not hijacking the thread but perhaps going off topic.

The accent does not always tell you the truth. Our youngest left home and went to Uni in Bournemouth. That had quite an effect but his move to living in London has. He tells us that when he spends a few days Up North then his friends all ask him to speak slowly so they can understand him.

Now the off topic bit. I often wonder just what job people tell others they do. A friend always says he is an undertaker and tells me that nobody really wants to talk work with him, makes for a nice holiday.

fwh

I have been asked when on hols before If i am from Australia, not idea why sound nothing like an Australian accent at all, which I found amusing. I am from Kent and when I visit folks in Cheshire My aunt and neighbours do miss words out of sentances i.e. I am going down road, instead of I'm going the road, it's funny because some of her neighbours have quizzed her in the past asking about her posh relatives from Kent i.e. ME (not posh one iota)

me,i have a black country accent (wolverhampton)but most people always think i am a brummie.nothing like it.well as far as i am concerned.
percy123.

More than once I've been mistaken for someone who lives up the Midlands/Yorkshire, not quite sure why lol