Haha - that's hilarious. Nothing like a good bit of mispronunciation! Thanks for sharing :)

Recently, I was telling a Korean friend that I would be going to the beach during an upcoming weekend.  He said that that was great but he wanted to warn me that the beach would be so crowded that I may have difficulty "taking a seat on the beach".  

He went on to add that if I would be taking the bus, that it too would be so crowded that it may be difficult to "take a seat on the bus"!  

Ordinarilly, I would simply thank him for the heads-up advice and go on my way - planning accordingly.  

My hesitation, however, stemmed from the fact that Koreans will generally pronounce the "s" as "sh".

So I don't have to get too graphic and colorful with the rest of the story, you can do the math from here.  

Believe me, I was thinking to myself, "Hey, that'll be no problem at all for me!  As a matter of fact, I rather prefer beautiful and clean beaches!  And as far as the bus ride goes, no problem there either.  I would think that we could all 'hold it' for a :45 minute bus ride!"  

It took me a few minutes to realize that my friend indeed had not grown up in a cave and that he was simply mispronouncing a few key words.  

Charlie Wilson 

South Korea via USA