Drop French, Says Heads And Teach Urdu Instead

The Telegraph (UK) ^ | 6-2-2002 | Macer Hall

[twigs]

I can read it and speak it to a limited degree.

I envy you. A number of years ago, I was engaged to a Welsh immigrant who came first to the US and then to Canada. He is a journalist, so he uses the English language beautifully. But when he told me he still thought in Welsh, which amazed me, I asked him to speak it. Wow! What a BEAUTIFUL language!

[varon]

They should use Ebonic-urdu. (my emphasis)

ROFLMAO

[varon]

There are literally hundreds of languages in India……………..//………………..The only language used nationwide is English.

There are more people speaking English in India than in the USA ;-)

[Myrddin]

My cousins in Pontrhydygroes said the same thing. They can speak English, but they think in Welsh. That sometimes causes a pause in response. I was out in the garden with my friends in Cwmystwyth one afternoon. A very beautiful bird landed on a nearby tree. My friends recognized the bird and knew what to call it...in Welsh. They didn't have any idea of what it was called in English.

I listen to Welsh music performed in the dialect that is common in the mid-valleys. My favorite folk group is "Plethyn". The lead singer in that group in Linda Healy. She has a number of her own albums. You can buy the music directly from Sain in Wales via their website. The Plethyn cassette "Teulu'r Tir" is a nice collection and representative of the typical fine quality of singing in very close harmony. Plethyn literally translates as "entwined".

Before I post this, I'll point out that Welsh is phonetic and those names have more vowels than are apparent. The name "Cwmyswyth" is approximately "koom UHST' with" for an English speaker. Pontrhydygroes is approximately "pont RID' uh groys". Stress is on the penultimate syllable. The "r" is always rolled.

[Eala]

Strangely enough, Scottish Gaelic was offered at Foothill Junior College, in Los Altos Hills, CA

No! I'm an FJC "graduate" (though it was a long time ago...). I know there is an active Bay Area group -- we hear a lot about them here in the Seattle area (Slighe nan Gaidheal).

[Eala]

I've been trying to learn Welsh for 10 years. I can read it and speak it to a limited degree.

It is difficult without a "support system." The wife knows a very little Welsh, though her years in the Seattle Welsh Choir gave her native pronunciation. :-) You're right about Scots Gaelic though... it's fallen to about 80,000 native speakers and it's anyone's guess which way it will go from here.

[twigs]

Thank you VERY much for the information about Welsh, particularly that about phonetics. I am currently back in college to get certified to teach English (and History) and I have found myself really drawn to the folk tales of Great Britain--Anglo-Saxon, Irish and Welsh. I would LOVE to know the languages, but at this point, have limited myself to learning Old English. I just got a book yesterday on learning OE grammar.

Genealogy is my hobby and from what I can tell, almost all my lines lead back to either Anglo-Saxon England or possibly Celtish Cornwall. My husband's genealogy, from what we know, seems to be all German and English, yet he is dark enough that he was asked by a Morroccan if he was an Arab. When I mentioned this to our family doctor, he suggested that he looks like his Welsh patients, a group who recently immigrated to this country. I thought that was interesting.

[philosofy123]

Where are you Pat Buchanan? You are a profit!

[blam]

"Where are you Pat Buchanan? You are a profit!"

Profit=Prophet (bump)

[gilor]

Euro Self-Hate/Guilt????

[Myrddin]

My PAF geneology database goes back to 1420. About 4,000 people in the database. The Welsh geneology comes to a halt at 1777 around the village of Llanfihangel y Creuddyn. The Welsh maintained a patronymic family name structure until 1756 when the English forced the use of surnames. Many Welsh created surnames by making a genitive form of a forename. Robert->Roberts, John->Johns, Edward->Edwards. Some patronymic forms were anglicized. John ap Howell became John Powell. Rhys ab Owain became Rhys Bowen. The original patronymic forms were generally maintained in 3 generation format and associated with a specific house name. My great great grandfather's house in Ysbty Ystwyth was name "Tynewydd" which translates as "new house". The address used by my friends in Cwmystwyth is given by their house name "Afallon" rather than by a house number on a road. That is the norm in the back country of Wales.

Good luck in the pursuit of your studies. If I can be of assistance in finding resources around Wales for you, please feel free to ask.

[twigs]

Thank you once again! I always thought that Owain became Owen, which is a frequent name in my collateral line, as is Johns (I'm from VA). My husband's dark coloring comes from his mother, who was a Dine, a name so far associated with the English. I have set aside the genealogy for awhile so that I can finish school, but I look forward to going back to it. My dear husband points out that I have a very bland genealogy (all A/S) but he obviously has interesting genes from somewhere!

Do you live in Wales now? My former finance was from Cardiff and he was still continuing to have difficulties because the building housing his birth certificate burned down years ago.

[Myrddin]

I'm in Idaho right now. I paid the cost of moving my family from San Diego, CA to Chubbuck, ID in December 2000. That pretty much drained my resources for vacation time in Wales for a bit. My customer in San Diego closed the business yesterday, so my job right now is lining up more work to keep the bills paid.

The vacations I've taken to Wales and contacts made have greatly improved my ability to find the right information with minimal effort. My two oldest sons will be headed back to college in the fall, so they have eliminated any financial resources for a vacation this year too.

If you can't afford to make the trip to the National Library in Aberyswyth, there are many reputable geneologists who can perform specific research on your behalf at the library. My friends in Cwmystwyth arranged quite a nice surprise on one of our visits. They located the actual paper document that transferred parental custody of my great grandfather and his two sisters to their uncle in Llanfihangel y Creuddyn in 1851. That document became a lead that showed that most of the family had come from that village. I had been on a few "wild goose chases" in adjacent villages with no prior success. Many of the original documents are archived in Aberystwyth. The many chapels around the country have consolidated their individual records at the national archive.

[CaptRon]

ROTFLMAO! You're going to get me FIRED!

[jimtorr]

Well, actually I'm not in the bay area anymore. I moved to Maryland two years ago, in the liberal waste land between DC and Baltimore. Sometimes I think the only reason I moved was so that I could freep the creep on saturdays.

[Eala]

Well, actually I'm not in the bay area anymore. I moved to Maryland two years ago, in the liberal waste land between DC and Baltimore.

Ha. Now you're pretty close to the East Coast center of Scottish Gaelic -- An Comunn Gàidhealach America (ACGA, The Gaelic Society of America) is sort of centered in Virginia -- Herndon, Richmond...

Cheers.