>>>>>>It's the same in English- the indefinite article a becomes an before a word starting with a vowel.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> For u it depends how it is pronounced - I think
>>>>>>
>>>>>>A U-Turn
>>>>>>An unrelated matter
>>>>>
>>>>>On a related note, same goes for words beginning with an aitch - "an honorable exception".
>>>>>
>>>>>Btw, a question for the anglophone majority here: is there a word in English which begins with a "u" and has it pronounced as u? Not as uh as in under, not as yoo as in universe, but as u as in butcher, lubricate?
>>>>
>>>>I thought 'U' was pronounced as in 'u' of Universe ?
>>>
>>>In in one. I was trying to think of an example and didn't think of that.
>>
>>Ubiquitous
>>Ullyses
>>Ukele
>>Useless
>>University
>>Unicorn
>>Uniform
>>Unique
>>In fact lots of 'Uni's - Latin one
>>Seems to me it's mainly words starting with 'un' which imply a negative that are not pronounced 'U'
>>e.g Unimaginative,Unlikely etc....
>
>ALL of these are pronounced with a y... yunivers, yuniform, yunik. Upanishad is pronounced without. Roma locuta, causa finita.

I think we're at cross purposes. If, in English, you are reciting the alphabet then:

U is pronounced as the U in Unicorn (yew? )
Y is pronpounced similar to 'why'