Good old human brains. Always picking patterns out of noise. And if you have someone to prime you in a certain direction, then it’s easy to see what you expect to see.
Case in point: this fantastic (and hilarious) music video in Hindi. Once you’ve had the (mildly risqué) English suggested to you, it’s very difficult not to hear it.
After you’ve dried the tears of mirth from your eyes and forgotten the lyrics, try watching the original without the subtitles and notice how the English disappears.
14 April 2008 at 2:13 pm
I have this problem all the time. When I hear something spoken that is not english and is not spanish I will more often than not hear spanish words.