I called up our favourite AMF bowling centre the other day to book a couple of lanes for tonight’s game with the gang.

The person who answered my phone call greeted me in a fast Aussie accent (of course!) that I didn’t quite catch what he just said. I wasn’t sure if I indeed called up AMF so I had to clarify.

“Hi. Is this the AMF bowling centre?” I asked the AMF employee. Let’s just call him John because I really didn’t catch his name when he introduced himself

“Yeritis (Yeah, it is),” Peter replied in a mumble. “Huhcanoihelpya? (How can I help you?)”

“Ah, yes. I’d like to book two lanes for Friday 8 o’clock. Thanks.”

“Roight. Huhmanypeople? (Right. How many people?)”

I paused a bit to count in my head the number of people going tonight but then decided just to pick any even number. It wouldn’t matter in the end anyway. “Twelve,” I replied.

“Thisfohtuhwlines? (This for two lanes?)”

“Yeah. Two lanes.”

“Huhmanyguys?”

Huh? How many guys? Why should it matter how many guys are there in proportion to the number of gals that are going to play bowling? Is there like a battle of the sexes that night or something? I quickly recounted the number of people going tonight at the same time counting how many are the guys in the group. I fear I was taking too long so I just picked any number again.

“Uh, I dunno. I think there’s like six guys and six gals,” I said. I continued to mutter along the same lines when the employee stopped me.

“Mate. Mate. How many games?” he asked more slowly this time.

This time round, he pronounced the word “games” more clearly. Or maybe I should say, more American with the A in GAMES pronounced like EI instead of AYE. I swear I heard him say GUYS instead. It’s probably due to the phone reception that I didn’t hear the mmm sound in games but if I did, I probably would’ve known he said “games” and not “guys.”

“Two games!” I hastily said. “Sorry about that. I thought you said guys instead of games.”

The employee was humourless about it though. Ah, well, that was embarassing. Anyway, he reiterated the number of lanes, the number of games and the booked time. I concurred and we said our good-byes and I thanked him.

Whew. This is why I kinda dread talking to Aussies over the phone. There’s always that chance that I’ll mishear what they’re saying, specially if he or she is the type of Aussie who talks real fast in a thick Aussie accent. In person, at the very least, I could try reading their lips to help me figure out what the words being said were.

Fortunately, most Aussies speak slower and more clearly (most consonants in words are enunciated). I just need to get used to some Aussies who speak faster and enunciates consonants less. I’ll get there one of these days.