The Czech Language II

It's probably time for a Czech language primer. I've experienced that uncomfortable feeling of needing to invent a pronunciation for words with far too few vowels. The goal of today's lesson is to help you correctly pronounce the names of places we visit. By the way, for a more exhaustive, and more correct, description of Czech, see wikipedia.

Most everything is essentially the same as English, except...
a = ah
á = ah (all of the vowels with this mark are pronounced slightly differently, but I can't pick it out)
c = ts like in bats
č = ch like in check
d' = dy
e = short e like in end
é = longer e like in pear (difference is a little more pronounced, I guess)
ě = ye like in yet
g = g like in gum
ch = a gutteral h like the ch in German
i = ee
í = ee
j = y as in yet
o = oh
n = n
ň = ny
r = r like a spanish r with a single roll
ř = this is the best - it is a trilled r with a ž (see below) after it.  The only other place I had heard a sound like this was in Argentina with people who were from the province of Corrientes.  They did the rr with the trill and the ž (though not quite so drawn out)
s = s
š = sh
t' = ty
u = oo like in foot
ů = oo like in moon (u with an accent above it does the same)
y = ee
ý = ee
z = z
ž = a sound like the s in leisure or the y or ll in Argentine Castellano

When consonants follow one another you just make the sound of each of the consonants without a vowel following it.  For example, the word for Thursday is čtvrtek and is simply pronounced ch-t-ver-tek.

Also, the accent is usually on the first syllable.

So, now you know that:
Tabor is pronounced Tah-bore
Praha is pronounced Prah-ha
Pivo is pronounced Pee-voh
Vepřove (pork) is pronounced Veh-prržoh-veh
etc.

Peter