Czech falls off motorbike, wakes up with British accent

A Czech speedway racer discovered his inner British toff after another rider ran over his head. Non-English speaker Matej Kus, 18, took the spill during a race in the UK. Paramedics were stunned when he came round and asked where he was – in perfect English. It soon became apparent that Kus had lost his memory, forgetting he …

[Anonymous Coward]

Speaking English

Do you think the same technique would work to get my marketing department to communicate in English? I've got my clue-bat under the desk ready and waiting...

[V.Srikrishnan]

FAS?!!!

Thats a new one i learnt today, Foreign Accent Syndrome!! I think the high rates charged by the meds are justified, since they produce beauties like this.

What about slurred speech after alcohol intake, Ethyl Alcohol Induced Voice Uncontrol(sic) Syndrome?

[Neill Mitchell]

Regional injuries

Explains why my biker mate Steve developed an East London accent - he got hit in the bollocks.

[Keith Turner]

Re-boot

I thought my machine took ages to re-boot but two days?!!

[Anonymous Coward]

Good idea!

So maybe we should hit students prior to French exams then? I'll suggest it to my wife when I get home.

[Law]

lmao

"It might sound funny to others, but suddenly thinking you are French is terrifying."

omg - i laughed out loud in the office to that line... classic!!

[Shane]

When abroad, just shout louder

Johnny Foreigner can speak English, they just don't try hard enough.

[Ian]

The fear....

of suddenly thinking I'm French has kept me awake at night.

quel est l'angle d'I.T ? :)

[Ex Pat]

Better than a Scots accent

Well, at least he did not wake up and find he had a Scottish accent, he'd probably would have topped himself.

Och ay way haggis.

[Anonymous Coward]

Francophonia

"It might sound funny to others, but suddenly thinking you are French is terrifying."

...and, based on requests I receive from France, would condemn you to constantly apologize for perfectly written English. I get a request from the USA, and it goes "hi how much can u tell me thanks". I get a request from France, and it's, "Dear sir: I am writing in regard to your product, and would like to know if you can ship to France and if so any relevant pricing information. Sorry for my English; I'm French."

Yeah... don't worry about it. :)

[Cliff]

I witnessed something similar

A friend once, started an in-depth conversation in German with the (previously unseen) German visitor to our room, which lasted all of a minute before the friend suddenly realised he didn't speak German. Not 'oh I did a bit at school', but none whatsoever. For the space of a minute (and confirmed by the German guy), he was speaking fully confidently and colloquially in a language he knew not a word of.

If there hadn't been half-a-dozen of us in the room at the time, I'd have dismissed it, but it happened. It's not even as if (unlike the Czech gentleman above) he could have subconsciously absorbed any of the language from TV.

There's more to this world than we understand...there must be!

[IanKRolfe]

Possible explaination

Since he was surrounded by Czech people, did it just "Sound like" English or was it actually coherent speech? These stories pop up from time to time, but no-one seems to recall what was said, or manages to get a recording. Apparently I sound Russian when I'm drunk, but I'm actually talking jibberish.

[Nano nano]

Could just be the accent ...

Once met a friend of a business client in Italy - he didn't speak English & I didn't (at the time) speak Italian ... but we both spoke French. However, his French accent was distinctly Yorkshire !!

[yeah, right.]

Brain damaged?

Does that mean that uni-lingual English speakers are really just brain damaged speakers of another language? That would explain so much!

ではまた

[Peter Fenelon]

Not unheard of....

Back in 1960, racing driver Cliff Allison (rather a forgotten figure now but a very good driver who gained some very good results for Lotus and Ferrari) crashed his Ferrari in qualifying for the Monaco Grand Prix and spent about two weeks unconscious.

When he 'came to' he spoke fluent French, despite never having understood a word of the language before.

Obviously

[Roger Paul]

Head Injury...

Hmmm... Could have stimulated the language centre of the brain. Or rather, the foreign language centre?

[Simpson]

British babies dropped on their head?

So a British accent = brain damage?

[Devraj]

Which way to the Register?

For a moment I thought I had reached the Ripley's Believe It Or Not site...

[Anonymous Coward]

It's called 'Fluent Dysphasia'

http://www.atomfilms.com/film/fluent_dysphasia.jsp

-betcha Y'all can't guess the denoument...

Fluent Dysphasia

After a hard night of drinking a man wakes to find

that he's fluent in Gaelic… but can no longer speak

English.

Interview with the Vampire's Stephen Rea

stars as a man facing a Celtic conundrum

in this tongue-twisted comedy.

[Ishkandar]

@Ian

I do believe that the correct term should be "Informatique"

@V.Srikrishnan - It's called "double Dutch", mate !! I speak absolutely fluent double Dutch after my 10th pint !!

@Good idea - ...but what if they should speak Kiswahili instead...

[Kenny Swan]

Strange...

If this is true, maybe it's linked to 'previous lives'? People sometimes get memories or feelings that they've been somewhere before or recognise something new and the issues of past lives has been known about but never studied or understood, as far as I know. Maybe this guy was English in a past life and maybe the woman was French in a past life. It's amazing what we could have in our head that we don't know about...

[Charles Manning]

I don't believe a word of this...

until I read it in Wikipedia!

[Anonymous Coward]

English accent

What is an English accent these days - Chavese?

[Anonymous Coward]

similar story

I'd never hear of this kind of thing before, then also today this came up -

http://news.ninemsn.com.au/article.aspx?id=296793

[michael]

You lot disgust me

My mother suffered a stroke approxamtely a year and a half ago. when she regained the ability to speak it was discovered that she was affected by Foreign Accent Syndrome. My mother came from south west london but now speaks with a eastern european accent. Making jokes about this affliction is somewhat disappointing as by this day in age I thought that the general public had moved on from the taking the piss out of peoples disabilities but obviously the majority of people reading these articles are still in the 50's with thise attitudes.... maybe we should drown my mother because she is different from the rest of you?? Hang on, why not paint the homosexuals pink too?? Oh and lets tar and feather the immigrants and remove the guide dogs from the blind. Like I said, you people disgust me.