Favourite Big City Names

[ChiSoxRox]

Originally Posted by Private Dick

The coolest big city name of all time:

Rio de Janeiro

Especially in the original Portuguese, sounding like "HRiu gee Zhanairu."

[MolsonExport]

Lubbock?

Sounds like Buttock. or Ham Hock.

[Metro-One]

Originally Posted by ThePhun1

Alexandria, Egypt

On a side note, there are plenty of those, such as Japan's native name. Heck, there's plenty of those that the average English speaker is too lazy to pronounce correctly and have thus mutated such as Las Vegas (it doesn't sound plural anymore unless you speak fluent Spanish), Albuquerque (it used to have an -r before the -q), Los Angeles, Sacramento--heck, basically any originally Spanish named place in just the Western US alone. There's also places like Detroit, St. Louis to name a couple in just the US alone, let alone place names internationally.

All languages are guilty of this, it is not unique to English.

For example the english pronounce of most Chinese cities is far closer to their native names than they are when spoken in Japanese. This is because the Japanese read the Chinese kanji in their Japanese pronunciations, not the Chinese. The same is true in reverse as well.

All other locations in the world are pronounced far different in Japanese than their native languages as well.

Home town example: Vancouver in Japanese is "Bankuuba" Only a few names sound close to their native pronunciation (essentially all constants need to be followed by a vowel or end with "n", also no Vs or Ls, plus a few other phonetical problems).

[SignalHillHiker]

I love names are muscular and sturdy - London, Boston, Belgrade, Amsterdam, etc.

I also love the ones that are soft, feminine - Sarajevo, Paris, Doha, Los Angeles, etc.

In Canada, I suppose my favourite is Montreal as it has qualities of both, especially when pronounced halfway between purely English and purely French, as it seems most uni-lingual, anglophone Canadians tend to do.

In the U.S., it'd probably be Chicago. Again, there are elements of both. (Unfortunate, though, that most people here pronounce it Shuh-CAR-go).

[ThePhun1]

Originally Posted by Metro-One

All languages are guilty of this, it is not unique to English.

For example the english pronounce of most Chinese cities is far closer to their native names than they are when spoken in Japanese. This is because the Japanese read the Chinese kanji in their Japanese pronunciations, not the Chinese. The same is true in reverse as well.

All other locations in the world are pronounced far different in Japanese than their native languages as well.

Home town example: Vancouver in Japanese is "Bankuuba" Only a few names sound close to their native pronunciation (essentially all constants need to be followed by a vowel or end with "n", also no Vs or Ls, plus a few other phonetical problems).

Consonants=constants.

Anyways, I see your point but there still is laziness on the part of the English speaker or in some cases, a speech impediment that catches on for a name and circulates over and over as was the case for Albuquerque.

On the one hand, it's just the nature of translating from one language to another but on the other is just a sign of the speaker not making the effort. I don't even speak other languages, yet still make the effort to try and pronounce words right, such as using a rolled tongue or recognizing an accent, such as in the Portuguese word for tradition, tradição (TRA-di-ceow if I'm not mistaken). That one is extreme but, like I said I try when I can.

[Jaborandi]

Oslo

[hammersklavier]

Originally Posted by PoshSteve

Al-Iskandariyah

Alexandria?

It looks like you over-Arabized there. The city was named after Alexander the Great. Its original name would have been Aλεξανδρεία -- or "Alexandreia" in Greek. "Al" as the Arabic definite article doesn't occur in this name the way it does in e.g. al-Makkah (Mecca) or al-Madina (take a wild guess).

The city whose name I like the most is probably Cuzco. I like it because (a) it's an untranslated Quechua name, (b) it's simple, and (c) because I like foreign-sounding names, like Koala Lumpur or Tehuantepec or Addis Ababa ...

Historically, the best city name ever, hands-down, was the Chimor capital of Chan Chan. Now it's a ruin a little south of Lima.

[SignalHillHiker]

Cuzco reminds me of Cozumel, which is such a beautifully tropical name.

[hipster duck]

The Bronx
Philadelphia
Halifax
Palermo
Vienna (but not Wien)
Stockholm
Chicago
Los Angeles
Faisalabad
Danzig (but not Gdansk)
Glasgow
Madrid
Madras (but not Chennai)
Medan
Isfahan
Dnepropetrovsk
A Coruna
Accra
Johannesburg
Algiers
Shijiazhuang
Joinville

[dc_denizen]

Byzantium
Vaasa, Finland
Sundsvall, Sweden
Dusseldorf
Dresden
Danzig
Rotterdam
Novgorod
Trondheim
Anchorage
Nome
Thule
Corvallis

[ThePhun1]

Originally Posted by dc_denizen

Byzantium
Vaasa, Finland
Sundsvall, Sweden
Dusseldorf
Dresden
Danzig
Rotterdam
Novgorod
Trondheim
Anchorage
Nome
Thule
Corvallis

Sorry, gotta go with Constantinople among the various historical names for that place.

[dc_denizen]

I like em both. Also, it was also called Nova Roma for a couple hundred years.

but:

That is no country for old men. The young
In one another’s arms, birds in the trees
—Those dying generations—at their song,
The salmon-falls, the mackerel-crowded seas,
Fish, flesh, or fowl, commend all summer long
Whatever is begotten, born, and dies.
Caught in that sensual music all neglect
Monuments of unageing intellect.

An aged man is but a paltry thing,
A tattered coat upon a stick, unless
Soul clap its hands and sing, and louder sing
For every tatter in its mortal dress,
Nor is there singing school but studying
Monuments of its own magnificence;
And therefore I have sailed the seas and come
To the holy city of Byzantium.

O sages standing in God’s holy fire
As in the gold mosaic of a wall,
Come from the holy fire, perne in a gyre,
And be the singing-masters of my soul.
Consume my heart away; sick with desire
And fastened to a dying animal
It knows not what it is; and gather me
Into the artifice of eternity.

Once out of nature I shall never take
My bodily form from any natural thing,
But such a form as Grecian goldsmiths make
Of hammered gold and gold enamelling
To keep a drowsy Emperor awake;
Or set upon a golden bough to sing
To lords and ladies of Byzantium
Of what is past, or passing, or to come.

[ThePhun1]

New Rome, eh? So you're telling me Istanbul has had four names?

[Shawn]

I actually don't like "Tokyo". If it's pronounced as a native speaker says it (toh kyoh, even stress), it's ok. The way it get's pronounced in English though (to-KI-yo) is gross. Same with Kyoto (kyoh-t vs. ki-YO-do).

I've always liked Novosibirsk. And any British "Town-on-River" (Avon on Stratford, etc.) sounds classy as heck.

[hauntedheadnc]

There seems to be some love for Atlanta in this thread, so I hate to be the odd man out... but the name of Atlanta bugs me. It's one letter off from a badass mythological character, Atalanta, and I think places named after gods, goddesses, and other mythological critters are really cool. But to merely feminize "Atlantic"? Lameness in a bottle.

[StethJeff]

Buenos Aires
Belo Horizonte
Sacramento
Los Angeles
Malibu
Ventura
Carmel
Monterey
Salinas
Fresno
Eureka
Sausalito
Santa Fe
Havana
Glasgow
Istanbul
Antalya
Izmir
Shanghai
Beijing
Kaohsiung

Things I generally dislike in a name:
1) New _____ , i.e. New York City, New Orleans, New Taipei. This is the most egregious to me. Cities whose founders were too unoriginal to come up with an actual new name so they just slapped "new" to an old name. Gawdawful.
2) _____ City, i.e. New York City, Panama City, Mexico City. Usually used to distinguish a city from its larger governing municipality and again a sign of zero originality. The name should stand on its own. Double whammy there for New York City. Nails on a chalkboard.
3) -ville, -land, -apolis. It just seems like you can add these suffixes to any word and come up with a city Mad Libs.

[StethJeff]

Originally Posted by hipster duck

Vienna (but not Wien)
Danzig (but not Gdansk)
Madras (but not Chennai)

You totally nailed it with those three. Agree completely. In fact Danzig might just be one of the coolest sounding words period.

[Matt]

Memphis

[Kenneth]

in the north where i live, Chicago is the big fun party town, same as New York. then Cleveland is mysterious. grand rapids and Kalamazoo should be one. Muskegon is a strange vibe. whats up Minneapolis..? St Paul, Dallas Ft Worth and then Indianapolis. now at home Detroit, is crazy but cant get enough

[Jeff]

always loved the names Kalispell, Montana and Odessa, Ukraine