Fried or German Grandmother?
That is the question which plagues me these days. As it turns out “Fritha” is difficult for a Brazilian to say. In fact, it sounds rather humorous when an American who is introducing me to the Brazilians and rolling along in melodious Portuguese suddenly says “Fritha” just like you would. Evidently my name is not a great fit. So the most obvious option is to simply pronounce the letters as if one was reading Portuguese. This ends up sounding like Free’ ta, which I really like since it sounds much more natural to the native tongue. The problem arises when the Brazilian attempting to pronounce my name begins to giggle… I look confused… and then the translator explains Frita means “fried” in Portuguese. So the Brazilians polled seem to prefer Freda which translated means, well, nothing at all. It is a random order of sounds that do not form a word in Portuguese: something similar to Jadi in English. My problem with Freda is that it sounds like a German grandmother. I, however, am not at the German grandmother stage of life.
So what do you think?
