[rapnie]

I guess the 'ui' and the 'g' are hardest to pronounce correctly for non-native Dutch speakers.

We have a tongue-twister for German and English people that goes like this "Ik eet uitsluitend gefruite uien in mijn geruite keuken" (you can have Google Translate read it out loud). Meaning is "I only eat fried onions in my checkered kitchen".

[thaumasiotes]

> Meaning is "I only eat fried onions in my checkered kitchen".

That sentence is more ambiguous in English than you might think! I'm curious which of these meanings are compatible with the Dutch:

1. The only thing I do in my checkered kitchen is eat fried onions. (Other activities don't take place in the checkered kitchen.)

2. Fried onions are the only thing I eat in my checkered kitchen. (Other foods must be eaten elsewhere.)

3. Fried onions are the only type of onion I eat in my checkered kitchen. (Raw onions must be eaten elsewhere, but eating steak in the kitchen is OK.)

4. My checkered kitchen is the only place in which I eat fried onions. (I'll eat steak anywhere, but I won't eat fried onions outside the kitchen.)

5. My checkered kitchen is the only one of my kitchens in which I eat fried onions. (I'll eat steak in any kitchen, but I won't eat fried onions in my plain white kitchen.)

6. My checkered kitchen is the only checkered kitchen in which I will eat fried onions. (I won't eat fried onions in your checkered kitchen, but I will eat them in the bedroom.)

[tripzilch]

I believe it's more accurate as "I exclusively eat sauteed onions in my checkered kitchen".

The only one it's not compatible with is 4, in that case the word "uitsluitend" ("exclusively") would appear elsewhere in the sentence.

Each of the others are ambiguous when written, but should be clear given pronunciation (emphasis), or the tiniest bit of context.

[rapnie]

Ha, that's cool. You found a lot of different interpretations. These also exist in Dutch. No. 3 comes closest to how most people would understand the meaning in Dutch, but some others like no. 4 would fit too.

[lucb1e]

I read it as having meaning #2 but it depends on the intonation and context. If you emphasize fried then it's #3. If we're talking about having fried onions and not in your kitchen I'd probably assume #4.

As for which ones work in Dutch, all of them.

[tripzilch]

Number 4 would be "Ik eet gefruite uien uitsluitend in mijn geruite keuken", though.

It mostly gets confusing for me because of moving back and forth between English and Dutch grammar, but any bit of context would make it a lot less ambiguous :)

[lucb1e]

Most things germans try to pronounce are just way off in general (living in germany, the topic comes up regularly), but by far the worst seems to be the sch as in Scheveningen or schatje. It usually turns into skatje and since that isn't a soft sound they morph it into an angry word to make fun of how our word for sweetie sounds after morphing.