Hanover Quay?

[U2DMfan]

I pronounced it 'kway" until someone on this board said it was "key" a year or so ago on this board.

Like quail=kwayl
or quaint=kwaint
or question=kwestion
or quality=kwal-i-tee
or quagmire or quandry or quiet or quiz or......you get the idea. All hard "kw"-sounds.

Qua is a Kw sound to most Americans.
So you can see why a lot of us pronounced it that way.

However if I visited Dublin and they told me it was "key" I would take them at their word, jamilia.

 

[martha]

In England it's key, so I figured it would be the same in Ireland.

 

[Paul Vox]

it's definitely Key

if it sounded like kay it was just an accent thing

it's one of those things that can catch you out though. Quay never got me because it's just a word I knew, but I always presumed that Guggi was pronounced Goo-Gee with a hard G in the middle, not Gug-ee with a soft G in the middle, and also thought Eli was pronounced Elly, not Ee-Lie until I heard bono say them in an interview

*edited to say I might have got my hard and soft Gs confused.....I'm not sure (I only had 4 hours sleep last night )

...just to clarify, are you saying it is "Gu jee" ? I thought Bono said "This is for you, Gu gee 11 o'clock tick tock" (too hard g's)

 

[bammo2]

yeah it's the one you thought it was. i just explained it really really badly cos I was tired