My Russian friends and other Russians whom I am introduced to have all noticed that, in the past year or so, I've started speaking with a Moscow accent. Now, my gf is from Moscow, and although she hasn't noticed a change in my intonation, HER friends and other people are now telling her that she's losing the slight NY accent she has when she speaks English. This evening, as we were leaving a party in Manhattan (pronounced mn-HAT-n if you live in the area), she said she's now started speaking English with "an Iowa accent" ...

So...here are some questions:

1. What accent do you speak in when you speak your native language? Don't tell me you don't have one, because everyone has an accent, even if it's the "standard" accent for the language in question.
Australian one, of course. Though I've been told it's kind of posh. See, I have this weirdass British lilt when I speak. it's from speech & drama classes when I was younger.

2. Do you mispronounce words because of your accent? I'm not talking about simple variant pronunciation. I'm talking about the way people in Boston say the word "career" like "Korea" and "Korea" like "career" (or, for example, the way Billy Joel sings about "Brender & Eddie" in "Scenes from an Italian Restaurant" ).
Hm. I'm not sure. All I know is sometimes my sentences end with the tone of my voice going up. As if it were a question I was asking. Not all the time, though.

3. Do you speak any other languages fluently enough to have a distinctive local accent in that language? For example, my Moscow accent, my friend's Parisian accent when he speaks French, etc.
No other languages fluenty, no.

4. Are any of your accents "looked down" upon? (For example, Cockney or similar accents in England, Algerian accents in French, Caucasus accents in Russian, Long Island accents in American English, etc., etc., etc. )
Heh. At the worst (or best) times, I have a distinct Australian yobbo tone to my speaking. Make of that what you will.

5. As long as we're speaking about accents, are there any foreign accents which, when you hear your native language spoken in, turn you on/sound pretty ?
I like a British accent. Think Hugh Grant. Niiiiice. A bit of a French accent isn't too bad either.

6. Are there any foreign accents which make your language sound awful?
A few.

Okay, that's it. 'Twas a short survey.
It was great survey. Well done.