Breakthroughs: Does anybody have small successes/breakthroughs speaking Cymraeg they want to share?

Frankly, I’d have been happy to come away with any old medicine if someone mistook me for a native Welsh speaker! (I would check the label before putting it in my ears, mind.)

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Mae’n ddrwg 'da fi! Didn’t see yesterday; in a town that wants to be a city, has hundreds of roundabouts and is and is known (to me) as gwlad chwyrligwgan (okay maybe not but I do love the word ‘chwyrligwgan’). Milton Keynes :rabbit2:

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I was hoping there might be a group near you, see list in n/l and section on Meetings and Events section above, but I’m not sure which is closest to MK., none very close, I’m afraid!

I went to watch my soon to be beloved Aberystwyth Town on the weekend (more on that here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UuJpzpsWZXY) and managed to hold a conversation with one of my friends that works at the club for about half an hour in Welsh, which was great!

What it taught me really is that SSiW certainly needs a very intense sports-specific lesson in future years :wink: as I found my typical conversation line going like this

“welsh welsh welsh welsh really impressive welsh welsh welsh RELEGATION BATTLE welsh welsh welsh BLATANT OFFSIDE welsh welsh superb welsh. absolutely amazing welsh, so much welsh it’s unbelievable TIER TWO DOMESTIC LICENCE SYSTEM welsh welsh welsh PHYSIO LOST HIS RAG welsh welsh welsh”

:slight_smile:

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Nicky, do some searching around the net, there’s plenty of sports related lesson dialogue or vocabulary around if you look.

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That sounds like the commentary on S4C!

Also - sounds like that physio had a point :wink:

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Oh, so you sounded like most first language Welsh speakers talking about football, then?..:wink:

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You should’ve seen him! Raging he was

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As Aran says, that’s pretty much a native-level conversation! :smile:

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I’ll second and third robbruce and Aran - that’s native football speak there!

If you get a chance, @Nicky, listen to “ar y marc” on a Saturday morning, Radio Cymru. It;s Dylan Jones (of Post Cyntaf news programme fame) and two or three others talking football for a half hour. I’m not particularly a football fan, but I love ar y marc, because it can be quite funny at times, but they spend quite a bit of time talking about Welsh club football as well as the more obvious English league stuff.

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Just got off the phone speaking to a lettings agency in Pwllheli. After introducing myself in Welsh and asking about the properties I was interested in (also in Welsh) I was put on hold whilst the lady at the other end of the phone spoke to a colleague. I also handled the courtesies of saying I was happy to wait and of resuming the call, all Yn Gymraeg.

I did slip to English to describe my current address in England (still only 90 percent confident, if that, with the Welsh Alphabet and, anyway, English place names and addresses use English letters). This (unsurprisingly) triggered a code switch to English at the other end. So I was asked my phone number in English. But then (magic!) I gave my phone number in Welsh and the agent switched back to Welsh to finish our conversation.

I guess I must have sounded sufficiently relaxed / confident in dictating the Welsh digits of my phone number to trigger the reverse code switch :smile:

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Brilliant.

That reminds me of a Cornish lesson one day where the teacher strongly recommended that we memorise how to say our phone number in Cornish, so that when asked to present it, we wouldn’t have to translate digit by digit but could effortlessly pull the entire string out of our mind.

Doing so for Welsh might also be a good idea, perhaps!

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Have I mentioned the unfortunate Returning Officer for Sir Gar who gave the result of their vote in the 1997 Devolution Referendum? It was the last result. All depended upon it. It was late. I was in bed with Cavalier King Charles on top listening to Radio Wales. The Returning Officer, well, I’l be charitable and say he was learning Welsh. I think his accent was Midlands English but it’s a while back now and I’m not sure. English certainly! He had not take the advice given above. He read out each figure excruciatingly slowly Ped-war Naw Een Een Pimp…someone had told him 'un 'doesn’t rhyme with the English ‘bun’! Way before he finished the ‘disagree’ vote, I was sobbing into my dog’s fur with relief and the hall behind him was going mad! We all knew the margin of votes needed to get a Senedd! But why didn’t someone take time to teach that poor man to read out the whole thing, not anguished digit by anguished digit?

Please excuse horrific blowing of own trumpet post, sorry!

I had the most fantastic weekend, on the course Ysgrifennu Creadigol i Ddysgwyr in Tŷ Newydd.
I went with a learner friend from Cardiff, and we thought it would be fun to take our 10 year olds, who are great friends and the kind of kids who really enjoy creative writing. Everyone made a huge fuss of them of course, and Steffi had such an amazing time that she has refused to speak a word of English to me ever since we got home! (Her little sister’s not at all sure about that - need to think of a plan for her now…)

Bethan Gwanas was one of the tutors, and on the last day she asked me however did I learn to speak Welsh so naturally! So I got in a bit of blowing the trumpet of SSIW too…

<\ end boast>

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Wish there was a way to like this several times!

:star: :star2: :star:

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Snap Snap Snap!
ps @netmouse fach, that isn’t a small success! That is a great big brontosaurus sized success!!! :mega:

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I heard (no, seriously, I actually heard) that there was some pretty serious talent on the course… :slight_smile:

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Llongyfarchiadau mawrion! SO fantastic in so many ways! :tada:

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This of course makes me curious as to what you heard from whom! It was a great weekend…

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