Oh I Guess I Do Have A Pittsburgh Accent After All

For some reason I have always maintained some sense of pride that I somehow turned out to be a bit more "cosmopolitan" than the majority of my Southwestern Pennsylvanian counterparts. This does not mean that I look down on them, but I just have a different set of life experiences that makes me the person that I am. With that being said, I am proud to be from this area. But I always figured that it was my little secret; that I could blend into the larger world seemlessly.

This past weekend, I was in Silver Spring, MD and talking to some of the locals. We were discussing colleges and Carnegie Mellon came up (ok, so I brought it up). A woman looked at me and asked, "Are you from Pittsburgh?" Oh; wait....how did she know that? Never for a second did I think that it was my accent or vocabulary (I didn't say "slippy" or "Liberty Tubes" or anything). But little did I know...I did. I said car-NEG-GEE Mellon and not CAR-neg-gee Mellon; like I guess the rest of the world says. But then again, maybe they are right and we are wrong, because I do [properly] say "CAR-neg-gee Hall". This woman then asked me to say "umbrella". Ok -- "UMB-rella". Ah-ha...busted! Because apparently everyone else says, "um-BRELLA". Oh well, who knew?

And how did she know all this? Well she used to have a roomate that was a Pittsburgher once upon a time. So she picked up on my accent right away; the accent I never knew I really even had!