The plastic-free vibe comes to North Wales

Plastic is a big problem. And society is cottoning on; you can see it for instance in the number of students who want to write their dissertation about it. And you sometimes hear about single-use-plastic-free shops and such, but I always figured that was a big city thing and it wouldn't reach the recesses of North Wales anytime soon. I was already quite chuffed we had a co-operative in the village. But then I saw an announcement a small shop in the Menai Bridge High Street, called Slates, had started going plastic-free! You could come in with your tupperware and buy things like rice and pasta and sugar by weight. Great! So I went. I was hoping for them to have olive oil too but they didn't. They were thinking about how to add it, though! And there's only so much of the products they sell there I eat, but now I can buy them without waste. I think it's great!

Rice and couscous but no waste!

Smug arts and crafts

I drink lots of coffee. Most of that is instant. Quite some of that is decaff. (And I'm not ashamed of it!) If you buy a pot of instant coffee you can quite easily buy refill bags for them, but for decaff, not so much. So I ended up with quite some glass jars. And these can go into the recycling bin but I thought maybe I can do something better with them. And then I figured I have a house that has produced lots of rubble. I am working on a dig that produces a lot of rubble. I take my students to beaches with lots of sand and pebbles. I can go all instagrammable and make these pots into candle holders with a meaning! So I started with one. The plumber had left some bags with rubble. I filled one jar up with that, and plonked a tea light on top. Le voila! Now I need to make a few more and I'm sure I'm quite riding the wave of home-made home decorations with a deeper meaning. It feels a bit weird but I like my new lantern! And should make a few more soon...

Ladders in the ladderway

While I had been either digging or staying home, the ThursdayNighters had explored a ladderway we had worked with before (I can't quite find when) and which they had deemed not really usable. Some ladders in it, though, were fine. And there is a rather central ladderway in the same mine that has some ladders missing. They had figured they'd sort that. And they had started that but there were two ladders to hoist up still. That was our plan for the night!

We gathered, changed, walked up and went to the top of the ladderway to ponder. Then we went down. At the bottom of the ladderway there is a sort of mezzanine level that leads to an ore chute you can drop to the next proper level down, and a shaft that's part flooded. The shaft had a new traverse past it! I had to try that.

 

Pondering

 The top of the shaft seen from the back

While some of us faffed around with the traverse and what was behind it, Edwyn rigged an elaborate 5-to-1 rig for hoisting up the infamously heavy ladders. Then we had to put the first ladder into position! And then the hoisting started. David and Phil were up in the ladderway to guide the ladder and put it in position; Dave L was hoisting; I helped feed the rope through, Edwyn guided the ladder from below, and Jason moved the rig every time we ran out of rope. Paul was sitting on the beam the rig was tied to to provide counterweight. With a 5-to-1 rig a modestly sized man like Dave can pull a heavy ladder up on his own! Things went well. Soon the ladder was in position. Then we started on the second one.

 Edwyn ties the first ladder to the rig

We did the same for the second. There was one incident with Jason getting his hand stuck but no serious damage was done. And the ladderway was complete again! We had a cup of tea and a sandwich to celebrate and then we went out. Nice and early! I'm liking these short Thursdaynighter trips. The week before it was nice and short too! I'm sure it won't last but I'm enjoying it while I can!

A million Welsh speakers

 What is a Welsh speaker? It seems that the Welsh Government thinks it's a person who lives in Britain and who considers themselves a Welsh speaker. Or a similar minor of which the parents think they're a Welsh speaker. When you see a statistic about how many people speak Welsh, it is not unlikely to have come out of the census. Every 10 years the Brits do a census and one of the questions is about what languages one speaks. It leads to nicely clear numbers: you know exactly how many people have ticked the box that says 'Welsh' in response to the question what language(s) they speak. And you can easily track from census to census how that number changes. But what does a tick mean?

Fluent and native speakers will tick that box. People who don't speak a word of Welsh will not. But what about people in the middle? Do people tick it when they can have a conversation? Do they tick it when they know a few phrases? Do people not tick it until they're fully fluent? I don't think anybody fully knows.

The Welsh government wants to see 1 million Welsh speakers by 2050. But what does that mean? I don't think anybody fully knows that either. And is it even a worthy cause? An invitation to a panel discussion on the topic fell into my mailbox and together with Jenny I went. When we got there we teamed up with Dani from my (old) Welsh class, and a lady I dan't met before but heard of.

The discussion was chaired by a Welsh writer and journalist. When he started, he joked that he hoped the audience, which in all likelihood consisted of Welsh speakers, would still be alive in 2050. Then he introduced the panel: academics from three different Welsh universities, and one from an Irish university. So what did they all think?

Some were optimistic and some pessimistic, but all of them were skeptical to a certain degree. Why this number of one million? Where is the money? What is actually done? And the most skeptical was the Irishman. He started by claiming that the Irish language was effectively dead. He said no young person used it as their main language, and thus the language would die out. The government had promoted education in Irish, but there was nowhere to use that skill. As he put it, they lead children up the stairs, but at the top of the stairs, there was no floor, so the kids all walked down the stairs again. And I know things are better in Wales but I know what he means! I put a lot of effort in learning Welsh, but at work I'm surrounded by English speakers, and I haven't had time to climb for a while, and climbing is my most Welsh hobby. If I speak Welsh in the local supermarket I tend to be answered in English. Where is that floor at the top of the stairs? The Irishman said research had pointed out that when a language is spoken by less than 70% of a community (and I assume, if there is an alternative available) that language goes into pretty much unstoppable decline. Just having spread-out Welsh speakers will not work; they have to clot together in >70% communities! But the risk is that if any money is spent, it goes to the communities with a lower percentage, and the viable communities are in peril.

I was wondering, though, if Jenny would not almost have caused a million Welsh speakers on her own. And now we need to clot together! Easier said than done, though, with a heavy academic job devouring one's time and energy. Oh well. We'll see how it goes, and I'll do my best within the limitations I work with! And I hope to still live here in 2050. If I do I sure will list myself as a Welsh speaker the next time the census comes along (in 2021). And probably in all ones that follow. We'll see! Let's hope the Welsh don't make the same mistakes the Irish have...

Plasterer and stove trouble

After I had oiled the ceiling a second time and the plumber had finished I was ready for the plasterer. But the plasterer not for me! He kept saying that he could start, just not as soon as he had previously said. Until he stopped answering my calls altogether. That is frustrating! I decided to look for another one. And that one would in all likelihood be just as busy, but maybe this one wouldn't stop answering my calls. That is a bit too much! So I phoned one, and booked him in for coming to have a look. We'll see!

The stove persons were also rather inert! If I would send them a text asking when they would do something again they tended to answer that after some time, and then indeed show up, but never to finish the work. Always one tiny step closer to completion! And then one day he mailed saying he couldn't get a liner into the one chimney. He said it needed sweeping!

 The fireplaces still waiting for their wood stoves

Having the chimneys swept was the first thing I did when I bought the house. But well, allegedly not a good job was done. I phoned another one. And booked him in! I hope that resolves the problem. And I hope things start moving again soon. This is getting a bit frustrating!

Office away from the office

Being in the School of Ocean Sciences has its advantages and disadvantages. One thing that could be either is that we are separate from the main campus. Our offices are on Anglesey, but we do the bulk of our teaching in Bangor. This involves a lot of moving to and fro. That can provide a welcome source of fresh air and exercise, but it can be a bit of a pain too. And you don't want to do it too often.

Sometimes, you have contact hours spread out over the day. It's not always worth going back to Menai Bridge in between! I used to either pop into the library for some work, or find an empty lecture room. That's not ideal, though; the library computers are sometimes all in use, and you can't really do marking in there as your own students may well be right behind you. And lecture rooms can be heavily occupied too, and some have rather awful facilities, with monitors that won't hang at face height, or which don't have a proper chair.

Since a while, we've had a hotdesk in one of the buildings on the central campus. That's brilliant! You have a proper computer in privacy, and a chair, and a building that contains a kitchen. I haven't had use of the kitchen yet; you need to borrow a fob for it, and that has to be signed off by your line manager. As if he doesn't have anything better to do! But one day I'll be able to make myself a cup of tea in there.

It's for all of us, but it only happened once that I found it occupied. By no fewer than two colleagues! But altogether it's a lovely invention. We can use our time more efficiently now! And the last time I was in it I had brought a radio. If I am doing things that don't need too much brainpower (faffing with spreadsheets, answering emails) I like to listen to some music or talking. It's still not as good as in the office (I like my double screen, for instance) but it's quite good!

Our hotdesk

First step towards settled status

Whatever happens, I should be allowed to stay in the country until December 2020. That's the end of the 'transition period' all EU citizens get. But I can apply for settled status. That process opens on March 30th, but there is a pilot scheme. It is a collaboration between the government and UK universities. I suppose the UK wants to keep the sort of people they like to keep; academics among these. So I was invited to register for the pilot scheme. Of course I jumped to the occasion! So I registered straight away. I was told I would get the actual invitation after some two or three weeks.

After a day or two I received the invitation. So now I should go and sort it! They only want a scan of my passport, and check whether I really live in the UK and not have committed too much crime. I should be OK! My National Insurance contribution seems to be enough evidence for me living here. And I am hardly a prolific criminal. I hope it all works out! Provided I get my hands on the required technology. The somewhat baffling fact is that you need a fairly recent android phone for it. I don't know what percentage of the population has that but I think it's a minority. Think alone of all the iPhone users! I have an android but, surprise surprise, it's too old.

Our Head of School had said he had tried to get phones for the school for the specific purpose; among the academic staff only, we have seven EU citizens (of 32), and at least 3 Brits married to EU citizens. The school would suffer a lot if EU citizens can't stay! Unfortunately, he hadn't succeeded.

I then tried to find out if the University had sorted something centrally. I figured it would; imagine how many EU citizens it employs in total! And indeed it had one (!) phone one could borrow. I seemed to have been the first; the app wasn't installed on it. I was a bit hesitant about putting it on; you need to log in on your Google account for doing that. I will have to make sure that login information will be removed afterwards! But I did it.

 Downloading the app

I got the app, but my passport was at home (oh dear). I made sure I Googled how to remove my login details from the phone, and did that. The phone was ready! But before I got to use it I already got a request to give it back asap. They will get that more often. One phone for the entire university!

I had a drop-in session at four, but I wasn't really needed so I decided to go home and use the phone. But that was harder than expected! The app scans the passport and your face, but it needs light for that. I have rather low light in most of my rooms! I should have done it in the bathroom; that has the brightest light in the house. I didn't think of that! And they don't let you have many attempts. I made do with the kitchen and the master living room. The passport was successfully scanned. I took a picture successfully, but some other scan wouldn't work. I will have to file additional information on the government website. I hope that's not too much hassle! Stay tuned...