The toughest words in Finnish?

[Kerppu]

Now tell me what are the toughest Finnish little words for a foreign speaker? Also what are the ugliest ones..? Let me throw out something to start for:

Köyliö
Möykky
Pyyntö
Rääkkylä
Työ
Töölö
Yö
Yötyö

It's always those letters Y and Ö.

[Hank W.]

Repeat after me please:

Yökyöpeli Kyösti kykkii pöyristyttävästi yöllä työpöydällä öylätti pöydän pyöreällä pyökkipinnalla.

[Juha H.]

If Kerppu's yötyö is not too difficult, you might try yötyöaieoionta. Or hääyöaieoionta (correction of an intention to spend a wedding night).

[kalmisto]

Now tell me what are the toughest Finnish little words for a foreign speaker? Also what are the ugliest ones..? Let me throw out something to start for:

Köyliö
Möykky
Pyyntö
Rääkkylä
Työ
Töölö
Yö
Yötyö

It's always those letters Y and Ö.

That depends on the foreigner,of course. I have heard that people from Somalia find Finnish easy to pronounce. I do not understand why the letter "ö" would be difficult for English speakers to pronounce. English speakers can say "bird" and "heard", why is "Töölö" difficult to say?

What about the ugly words? I believe that many of the Finnish words that an Englishman finds ugly sound all right to Arabic speakers, Japanese speakers and many others.

The beauty is in the eye of the beholder and it is also in the ear of the listener.

Most Finnish words sound bad to Swedes and it is very likely that they sound as bad to Norwegians and Danes.

[melinsuomi]

why should finnish be difficult to pronounce???...i mean...sometimes you might need to stretch your tongue....but...it´s ok... My mothertongue is Dutch and (let´s count) i use about (a e i o u) 5 vowels...but than you have (ei ij ou au ui eu ie oe aai oei eeu ieu) 11 dubbelvowels or however you call that in english....so i feel sorry for those who want to learn Dutch...and lat´s say finnish is still ok

*let me know where i might have been wrong*

[Darkfire]

Well when i learned english I was already exposed to it, so it took awhile to learn but hey its actually a kind a easy lang, but what makes english hard is our grammar and vowels, english is diffrent you pronouce it like you hear it or something like that its not restrictive like other langs.

[Rosamunda]

ryijy

I always have to take a deep breath before that word. Luckily I don't seem to need it too often!

[kalmisto]

ryijy

I always have to take a deep breath before that word. Luckily I don't seem to need it too often!

There is only one more word in Finnish that is very similar to "ryijy" and that word is "lyijy" ( lead - the metal )

Words like myijy ,tyijy or kyijy do not exist.

[sinikala]

Now tell me what are the toughest Finnish little words for a foreign speaker? Also what are the ugliest ones..? Let me throw out something to start for:

Köyliö
Möykky
Pyyntö
Rääkkylä
Työ
Töölö
Yö
Yötyö

It's always those letters Y and Ö.

Many people consider työ an ugly word in any language.

[159753]

why should finnish be difficult to pronounce???...i mean...sometimes you might need to stretch your tongue....but...it´s ok... My mothertongue is Dutch and (let´s count) i use about (a e i o u) 5 vowels...but than you have (ei ij ou au ui eu ie oe aai oei eeu ieu) 11 dubbelvowels or however you call that in english....so i feel sorry for those who want to learn Dutch...and lat´s say finnish is still ok

*let me know where i might have been wrong*

Melinsuomi, the term you are looking for is diphthongs (try a get a Finn to pronounce that!). The main English diphthongs are ee, ea, oi, ou, au, eu, eau, ai and ie.

Difficulties in pronunciation depends simply on the fact many sounds that one language uses all the time like in French the nasal sounds of an, on and un, the guttural j sound, are pretty much unheard of in English or the southern English try and pronounce the German ch sound. Thank God that Finns have problems with ch, th, sh, ph, bh (as the name, Siobhan) and rh. One Finn said “sit” rather than “sh*t”.

[Samira]

If you think double vowels are hard, try quad vowels. "Maa-aateli" is a real word, believe it or not, and refers to one of the higher castes in Finland back in the 16th century or so. (Just use a glottal stop where the dash is, and it'll come out about right.)

159753: I have no problem pronouncing "diphthong", and I seem to have a very un-Finnish ability to mix back and front(? I'm not a linguist, and have no idea if those terms are correct) vowels in speech without getting confused. Take, for example, "olympialaiset".

[Hank W.]

maa-aateli is a bit of a tonguetwister in English too, or how would a Finn say "landed gentry" quickly

[Phaeton]

As a Finn I thing that most awful word is the word "I’m not torturing" or just the word torture. So it goes like this.

Person 1 : don’t torture that cat
Person 2: I’m not torturing it

Person 1: Älä rääkkää sitä kissaa
Person 2: En mä RÄÄKKÄÄKÄÄN!!!

[Hank W.]

I can top that.

1. Do not torture that geezer, geezer-torturer
2. i'm not torturing the geezer, don't whine, whiner.
3. I am not whining, I am laughing, nagger.

Älä rääkkää kääkkää kääkänrääkkääjä
Enhän mä rääkkääkkään kääkkää, älä käkätä käkättäjä.
En mä käkätä, mä räkätän, mäkättäjä.

[JuliaB]

Regular pronounciation is not so hard for me, but reading aloud is where I get stuck. Often when I learn a word in the course of conversation I make a mental immage of it, but if that word is accually a compound word when I see it wtten out I cannot recognise it.

I take one look at words like "perhetapahtumailmoituksista" and think, fffffff I am never going to figure that word out. And looking it up in the dicionary is ofen more work then it is worth, looking up more that one word, plus trying to figure out if it is in the genative for or any suffexes.