Adventures in the alphabet

(Roman temple in Évora, Portugal)

A guide to Roman excavations in Lisbon pointed out the 'ood supports that underlie many of the city's buildings. A hotel keeper in Porto told me 'i-fi was available in the room, and she wasn't talking about stereo.

Then it occurred to me what an odd sound the consonantal W is. It's so common in English, but what other languages have it? Arabic, maybe, though a guide on my trip to Tunisia was sparked to tell a story about the habits of his countrymen by an 'ooman he saw crossing the street in front of our tour bus.

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If the letter W is a closed book to speakers of Portuguese, X may puzzle visitors to Portugal. It's pronounced sh in Portuguese, so the bar Maria Caxuxa in Lisbon is pronounced, delightfully, "Maria Ca-SHOO-sha."

Got that? X=sh. With that in mind, what do you think puxe means?

Wrong. It means pull.

© Peter Rozovsky 2011