Petersburgian Case File #5: The Dapper Era of the Draper Has Never Left St. Pete

The Russians may not be in love with Americans as a people but they sure love our language.* As such transliterations are a huge thing here. All over the place you will see various English words written out using Cyrillic letters. Essentially it is the same word just with a faux Russian accent added onto it. And one might think that just saying the word in English (that is, saying the word properly) would suffice but 3 times out of 5 they'll just stare at you with a blank expression.

I don't have a particularly witty caption for this I just really wanted to share this picture.

The result of these transliterations are more often than not pretty hilarious - there is just something really funny about having to pronounce the word muffin "maf-fyen". My favorite one, however, is the city's biggest chain of coffee shops - their version of Starbucks: Coffee House!

Behold how primitive and not green and white it's logo is!

So the first word is, simply enough, кофе (phonetically: kofe) - they sound similar, and Russians use the same word as English speakers so that is perfectly fine. It is part 2 of 2 where problems start to arise. The Russian word for house is дом (phonetically: dom). Keenly observant followers of this blog may notice that the letters following кофе in the picture above look dissimilar to the letters in the word дом. хауз phonetically sounds like hauz or basically an accented, slightly stupid pronunciation of the English word house. In and of itself that is fairly amusing but the reason it really gets me is that whenever I see хауз and pronounce it in Russian I can't help but think of Peggy, from Mad Men, screaming PIZZA HAUZ! And so that delightful image floods into my mind whenever I pass by one of these. Soon enough the sheen will wear off and Elizabeth Moss will become the bane of my existence - haunting my every dream with her barbaric scream of pizza hauz. [God knows Fred Armisen is already one of the banes of my existence...She was married to him, isn't that so weird?...Ugh Portlandia is a television show...*glares angrily while muttering under my breath* Fred Armisen]

Ugh just look at him, damn it! ARMISEEEEEN!!!

Until that day comes I will be utterly delighted by every кофе хауз I pass by, smiling uncontrollably at what I imagine Russians assume is the spirit of capitalism and the comforting 21st century knowledge that a semi-decently prepared cup of coffee could be mine with only a step through the door. Personally I think the real reason is a bit more profound but we can just keep that between you and me.

*Our language being American because in America you speak American, damn it or the terrorists have won!