Out of the blue, I got an email from the School of Educational Sciences. They had planned an afternoon on the theme of working bilingually. And it turned out that Jenny, my Welsh tutor, had put my name forward for that. They wanted a panel discussion about learning Welsh as University staff. Well, I know about that! So I said I was interested.
They then sent me the program. It had me on the panel, with one lady I knew from other events for Welsh learners, and one lady I hadn't met before. It also had two surprises; the first one was that it all started with half an hour of learning Irish, and the last one that it was followed by a session of learning how to sing the Welsh National anthem. We had just been told that week that the University had a new policy; they would have a choir sing this song during every graduation ceremony, and they wanted as many staff as possible to sing along. But they also knew that quite a lot of staff wouldn't be familiar with it.
On the day I of the event I walked in, met the organiser, and met my fellow panel member Karin. She was German. The third lady, who is Greek, had Covid and would be joining us on Teams. I figured it was not surprising we were all foreign women; I am not impressed by British language provision, so not being British pretty much gives you a head-start in learning new languages. And learning languages in the first place seems to be a female thing. I'm not sure why that is. I should have a bit of a Google; I am sure that people have studied this! But anyway; we first had lunch and then we sat down for the lesson in Irish.
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| Rhian Tomos chairing |
It was a very British session. The man leading it basically just started saying very basic things of which we could guess the meaning in Irish to us, and expected us to repeat them. No vocabulary, no grammar, no pronunciation rules. But the chap was very charismatic and it was quite a lot of fun. For those unfamiliar with the language, the pronunciation is rather unpredictable!
We got as far as hello, my name is Margot, how are you? Very well, thank you. And you? Very well, thank you. Bye! But then there were some minutes left and the floor could ask insightful questions about things such as how mutations are expressed in Irish. That was the best bit actually!
Next we were asked to express our thoughts about things such as learning Welsh, working in Welsh, and suchlike on a Padlet. And then it was time for our panel discussion.
We were questioned by a bloke about our experiences learning Welsh, and things such as what our Welsh speaking colleagues could do to support us. There wasn't really any opportunity for the floor to ask things! That surprise me a bit. But I wasn't gonna make a point of it.
After a few minutes, those interested in practising the national anthem went to the building across the road. There was a lecture theatre there that had a grand piano. And the lady who had chaired the bilingualism session now took a seat behind it. She also had some resources; sheet music and lyrics. I can't read music but the lyrics helped; I only knew about 85% of them. And the support that was given was mainly about the words! That is not the hard bit. Not for me, anyway. I don't really know the melody, and I can't sing. That makes things hard!
When she first started playing and singing she started rather high, and the melody goes up from the start. I couldn't possibly sing at that pitch. The baritone beside me couldn't either. After she was done we asked if she could go a bit lower, but she said she couldn't transpose the music. We had to find our own way! Oh dear.
Practice makes perfect, though; after several attempts I was feeling a lot more confident. I'm sure I'm still a bit off key but not catastrophically so. This will have to be enough!
And with that sorted I jumped on my bike again and went home. It has been an unusual afternoon, but it had been enjoyable! And now I had to get back to serious work…
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