Hello, I am thinking of teaching English in Japan for a year or two. I have never been out of my country before, and I have heard some people comment that our accents can be quite difficult to follow. Obviously there are many vastly different accents in my country but I was just wondering if the average native English speaker outside my country can understand my speech easily.

So I decided to conduct a small experiment. I recorded myself reading a news article off the internet and would like to ask you if you can understand my speech easily. Also, would you care to hazard a guess which country I am from? This will let me know if my accent is close to neutral or very 'local'. Many thanks, I appreciate your comments.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B36A9e1cOKE&feature=player_embedded