Meow mix

Do cats sound different in Japan? No, but they do sound different if you are a native Japanese speaker. To English speakers, a cat says "meow," but the Japanese equivalent is "nyaa." Korean dogs say "wang-wang" and Spanish sheep say "meeee."

Check out these and many more: Sounds of the World's Animals

Apparently the language we speak has a profound effect on what we hear when our ears encounter a certain set of frequencies, ie a sound. Both the vowels and the consonants differ-- m's for n's, au's for aaah's.

Note that certain sounds are related, though. It is pretty common for some interpretations to have a "k" sound where others have a "g" (for example, on the frog page-- the English "ribbit" is an odd exception). Another frequent set is "m" and "b" (for example, on the sheep page). This reminds me of Japanese! These sounds are precisely the ones that are linked by sets of diacritical marks on the Japanese phonemes. I always thought it was odd that "m" with the diacritical marks was pronounced as a "b", but it seems that something fundamental really is going on there.

Back to the animal sounds, I remember the moment when I realized that my cat truly cannot understand what I say to him. I was in Japan, and there was a cat in the hotel lobby that I was petting and coaxing into a rough purr. A Japanese child approached and cooed to the cat as people do with animals.... in Japanese. My first thought was, "Of course the cat won't respond to that-- it's Japanese! I can barely understand that!" That's when I realized that English can't be any easier on the feline brain :-).

What does your pet say?