Toyota = Abundance of rice

[eTiMaGo]

Originally Posted by GeneW

I think this goes both ways.... I've heard some Japanese pronounce "McDonald's", it comes out sounding like "Mac Don-Al-Da". A little patience and respect for the speaker's dignity goes a long way in communicating.

Gene

Yep, but in this case that's to do with the limitations of their language, if there's no phonetic "DZ" kinda sound in Japanese, they have to approximate with the closest native sound. Same reason why it took me years to pronounce "the" properly (no TH sound in French)

seeing KARAOKE and pronouncing it KARI-OKIE is just... er...