h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

PaperKid's school is going to have a talent show next month. She has decided to do tongue twisters. While she is researching tongue twisters on her own, I thought I'd give you guys a chance to contribute either brand-new ones, or ones that already exist but *aren't* the standard Peter Piper, sea-shell-selling, rubber baby buggy bumper ones. Just please keep in mind that she's 10, so the tongue twisters need to be child-friendly

Betty bought a bit of butter, but the bit of butter Betty bought was bitter, so Betty bought another bit of butter. If Betty bought another bit of butter where's the other bit of butter Betty bought?

I never made it past selling sea shells

I think the worst is the one with witches with Swatch watches.

I know a few tongue twisters, but they're all in French.
That might be a bit much...

Child-friendly.. no point in telling you about the pheasant plucker, then.

Good blood, bad blood.

Red leather, yellow leather.

The sixth sick sheik's sixth sheep's sick.

Timothy Thistlethwaite, the unsuccessful thistle-sifter, thrust three thousand thistles through the thick of his thumb while sifting a sieve of unsifted thistles.

In a couple of episodes of Pinky & The Brain, Brain goes by the alias "Dr. Jiggleitalittleitllopen" Jiggle it a little it'll open. That's fun to say.

The Czar's bizarre beaux-arts.

The butter one's pretty awesome/horrible - pick your choice - too but otherwise I'm with Hati and the Swiss witches' watches

Blimey, I haven't hear the thistle-sifting one for decades, albeit in a different version. Having tried to recite it: "Theophilus the thistle sifter, while sifting a sieve full of unsifted thistles, thrust three thousand thistles through the thick of his thumb" I've discovered that advancing years make it difficult to do that in one breath as easily I used to

If she wants to have a go at a foreign one, here's one in Russian:

SHLA SAsha PA shoSEI i soSAla SOOshkoo

(Sasha walked along the road sucking on a bread snacky thing)

My favourite tongue twister is German. I never saw it written down, and it's a long time since I last said it, but I think it goes something like this:

Fisches Fritz fischt frische Fische. Frische Fische fischt Fisches Fritz.

(Fishy Fritz fished fresh fish. Fresh fish fished Fishy Fritz)

That's hard in both languages! Not that I tried--I'm eating right now...

She sells sea shells on the sea shore

Or you could try to wrap your tongue around one of the world's longest palindromes; the Finnish saippuakivikauppias

...although I haven't managed to find it pronounced online yet

She's actually decided to do improv with a friend, instead. Yes, the camcorder will be going

Probably a bit late (I'm catching up on backlog), but I could contribute some Hebrew tongue twisters, if you're interested.

Such as...
'Gannan giddel dagan bagan, dagan gadol gadal bagan'
(lit.: 'a gardener grew a big cereal in the garden, a big cereal grew in the garden')
'Sara shara shir sameah, shir sameah shara Sara'
(lit.: 'Sarah sang a happy song, a happy song sang Sarah')
'Nahash nashakh nahash, vehanahash hanashukh nashakh et hanahash hanoshekh'
(lit.: 'a snake bit a snake, and the bitten snake bit the biting snake')

...or whatever else comes to mind.

Also, it might be relatively easy to say 'bakbook bli pkak' (lit.: 'a bottle without a cork/cap') once, but if you try to repeat it fast, you usually end up with gibberish after just a few times.

I can see the snake one being a tongue twister in English

The bottle one could be said over and over in the coop to see how the chickens react

Three grey geese ran over the grass. Green was the grass, grey were the geese