My boyfriend Chris and I have spent the better part of our first week in Sydney looking for a place suitable for us to rest out heads at the end of each glorious day (i.e. an apartment or flat depending on your persuasion). It’s essentially become our only topic of conversation, our main point of interest, it’s taken over our Google searches and is my main daily activity. But, I digress from the point I’m aiming to make with this post. One place that we’re particularly fond of is an almost terrace style house on a street called “McGarvie”. I say almost because there is only a terrace on the 2ndfloor, the first floor door opens straight onto the street whereas the standard terrace houses have small front decks with planters and such to buffer your door from the street. In American English, one would see the street name McGarvie and pronounce it, as anyone who’s most likely reading this blog would do, with the R. However, Australians aren’t too pleased with the letter R and typically drop Rs out of every word they speak. Thus, there is a chance we’re going to live on a street more commonly understood to the natives as McGavie (absence of an R). I wonder now, why even bother with naming the street McGarvie in the first place if it will be constantly pronounced as McGavie?