distinctions, the so-called Colombo elite of the "Colombo 07" families of Sri Lanka consider English to be their first language, and the variety of English spoken by them is considered to be closer to the international standard of English. However, the further one goes from the main areas of Colombo, the greater is the influence of Sinhalese and Tamil on the English that is spoken there, with varying degrees of bilingualism. Colloquialisms Colloquialisms have emerged in SLE. Some involve vocabulary. Others involve grammar (such as tense and plurals), syntax and intonation. Vocabulary Grammar Words and tags may be added, subtracted, overused, or changed in order and tense in SLE. Pronunciation Speakers of Sri Lankan English have varying ability to produce certain sounds. Again, the sound of in "father" and in "luck" are absent in Sinhala; so, Sri Lankans may have difficulty pronouncing them in SLE. However, these sounds were adapted to Sinhalese alphabet, (e.g., ෆ, fa), thus many Sri Lankans experience no trouble in proper pronunciation of these sounds. Syncope occurs, as it does in many other languages. For example, "exercise" and "conversation" may be pronounced "excise" and "conversion". Additionally, some differences in pronunciation may relate to socioeconomic background and level of education. For example, a word like "note" is pronounced with a diphthong, , in standard English. In SLE, it is pronounced with the monophthong; and is accepted as normal in Sri Lanka. However, pronouncing a word like "hall" () as * is not accepted. The non-standard variety "Not Pot English" is formed based on the variant pronunciations of /o/ and /ɔ/ sounds by the Sri Lankan speakers. The confusion between full and half /o/ sounds is noted as a class marker; the label "Not Pot" itself reflects this mispronunciation. Confused words for Sri Lankan speakers include hall and hole, ball and bowl, and phone and call. Examples of some other words pronounced with a monophthong include "take" and "made", "cake" and "rake", and "go" and "no". Those unfamiliar with English may add an involuntary /i-/ prior to words like "skill" and "smell". However, this is not standard in SLE. Other features Some elided syllables in English are pronounced in SLE. For example, "different" would be pronounced "diff-er-ent" () and "basically" would be pronounced "bay-si-cal-ly" (). Also, some syllables normally unstressed and sounded as /ə/ may be sounded as /a(ː)/ (or, /o/, /u/, /e/ or /i/). For example, the