I know this!!!! I asked tali this recently. Chanukah is actually the correct form but it’s known better as Hanukkah in America because many cannot pronounce the “Ch” sound. Happy Chanukah to you :)
Officially, it’s חֲנֻכָּה or חנוכה—whether or not you put in the C depends upon how you transliterate the characters.
The pronunciation has a bit of a “clearing your throat” sound that a lot of Americans can’t do (like PnL up there says), but the dumbed down H- beginning works just fine. People know what you mean either way.
It’s just a transliteration from the Hebrew, but in its original form, as written by laureth above, the first letter of the word is a “ch” sound, not a “h” sound.
Both are correct – transliterations of the Hebrew. I usually spell it Chanukah. As mentioned above by gailcalled, the “ch” sound is similar the “ch” in “Bach”. In Latin America, my Jewish friends write it “Janukah” since the “J” sound in spanish is similar to the “ch” in Hebrew (think of the sound that the J makes in a spanish name like “Javier”).