What's in a Name

Okay,

The big question before I came was "How should I pronounce Qatar?" There were three possible ways and I was using all of them..

We have "Ka-tar" The Ka is like the beginning of the word "CAT" and the tar is pronounced just like "tar" This was the Honduran way and lost steam once we came to the US.

There was "Ku-tar" The Ku is pronounced like the beginning of the word "Cut" and the tar again is pronounced just like "tar"

And finally there is "Cu-ter" This is pronounced just like Cutter.

What was interesting about this argument was that people who seemed to be in the know disagreed about which pronounciation was correct. There was even one Canadian, who will remain nameless, that said to me "It is Ku-tar..not Cu-ter..I swear..You Americans just like giving names to countries!"

So, now that I have spent about 3 weeks here I am surely the expert, right? Wrong! I have heard so many different pronounciations that I am totally perplexed. I honestly believe that the real pronounciation is not possible from a Westerners mouth.

I have heard the local "Qataris" (By the way, there is no disgreement how to say this..it is cutteries...just like I spelt it) pronounce Qatar and then I would say it and they would say "No no no no" It is like this "Qatar" and I would say it and they would say "No no no no" You get the picture I am sure

What is interesting is how confident the people from the US, Canada, Australia, the UK, and New Zealand are about how the word is said. I think you could ask one and they will have give a different answer. Of course, to their ears they might think they are saying the same word.

It might not be in an Australian's vocabulary to say "Cu-ter" It might just come out as "Ku-tar" .

In the end, I am going with "Ku-tar" and I will tell you why. When telling someone that I live in "Cu-ter" they have no idea where that is...I mean the word is spelt QATAR. I get a look like "Can't you read?". At least with Ku-tar there is some initial agreement. The Honduran "Ka-tar" doesn't work because there is no "u" in Qatar.

Anyway, I refuse to be one of those people who "KNOWS" how to pronounce Qatar.