[Acajack]

Originally Posted by jonny24

I used to be pretty good at distinguishing Aus/NS/SA (it's a common joke, but fush+chups vs feesh+cheeps really does help)

However, I've been getting worse at it I think. I watch a ton of rugby, I encounter all those accents a lot, but it's so commonly mixed company that they all start to blur. Only in certain directions though. A lot of the time, it'll take me a few words or sentences to realize the speaker is Aussie and not English, but I would never mistake English for Aussie.

It's funny that "house" is a word that Canadians get "caught out" on, I've had that exact conversation with my finacee's family. They spent 5 years in Sydney, and now her dad is dating a girl from Melbourne so we talk about it sometimes and "house" was discussed in depth. She thinks we say it too short, I think she's saying about two vowels too many and swallowing at the same time.. "hay-owgh-se".... She laughed at that

I have a pretty good grasp of "northern" vs "southern" English, but not anything more refined than that. If they have hard R's then possibly "west country". I can notice different Irish accents but have no idea on placing them with any area or class, just that they're different. I have a co worker that's from Belfast so if I hear the odd word said exactly like him then I guess Northern.
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I've noticed over time that I've gotten better at picking out francophone accents from overseas. The French and Belgians and Swiss all used to sound the same to me. Now I am getting pretty good at distinguishing them, especially the Belgians. I heard someone on the radio recently (he was living in Canada) and he had a European French accent and I could tell he was Belgian. Even though he did not use any of the tell-tale Belgian words.