Furry Hedge

Furry what? You may well ask. I do, in fact, refer to Budapest airport, or Ferihegy, to give it its correct name. Having only seen it written down before my first trip to Hungary four years ago, I assumed that it would be pronounced something like "ferry-heggy". Not so. To my unaccustomed ear its true pronunciation sounds remarkably like - you've guessed it - "furry hedge". It could be a euphemism for something unsavoury, couldn't it?

This has implications. Some of the more cosmopolitan among you may know people called Gyorgy. Having now had a brief overview of the Hungarian language in all its Finno-Ugric glory, I now know that "Georgie" is really plain "George", and am suffering from retroactive social embarrassment.

Still, I can always cheer myself up with a cheap laugh over the fact that the Hungarian word for cheese is sajt, pronounced "shite". And hey, it's only my first day here.