The trick is to talk while you are inhaling

This summer my husband and I watched all three of the Swedish movie adaptations of Stieg Larsson's books. The first one was The Girl with the Dragon Tatoo. I had read the books but had mixed feelings about watching European adaptations of these books about mental, physical and sexual abuse. Much to my surprise I really liked them and the actors who portrayed the main characters. Of course, we had to read the subtitles, but it did not put me off at all. We discovered that there were quite a few similarities between English and Swedish. By the way, that is not the case with Finnish. Nothing about Finnish sounds even vaguely familiar.

One of the qualities I noticed was that Salander would almost whisper 'ya.' Mikael would ask her questions and she would repeatedly whisper yes.

Now that I am in Finland I have learned the secret to that simple word. The secret is to say the word while inhaling air. It seems to be a fairly common practice used mostly by women. Of course, in Finland, the word "yes" is pronounced YO as in yoyo. I have tried doing the inhale and speak thing but am hopeless at doing it. I am in awe of Noomi Rapace and her whispery ya.

Earl and I were in an orientation class about differences between American and Finnish ways to communicate. One of the women asked the instructor about the breathy yo. We all laughed as the teacher gave us a very good demonstration of exactly what was meant. She even tried to say a phrase while inhaling as well as saying yo.

So your challenge is to master the complex means of saying, "Yo yo yo." A frequently overheard sequence of yeses.

When Earl came home from his meetings, he mentioned that 'oui' was a perfect way to say yes while inhaling. Much easier to do than saying yo.

By the way, thank you is kiitos pronounced 'key - toes.'