Saturday, February 09, 2008

 

09 Feb Land of My Fathers - or Mothers!

Noswaith dda!
Today I am Welsh! So I greet you with a Good Evening in Welsh.

Wales has always been important to us - many holidays have spent camping or in a cottage within the wondrous scenery.

We didn't know then that we would have one of our offspring so drawn to Wales that they would spend their life there. And there are friends who have settled there too.

When I was a child I used to proudly announce to my friends that I was Welsh - on the strength of having a Grandmother named Jessie Jones.
All I actually knew was her name and that she had grown up in Kent.
She was actually born in Cheshire and there is a tenuous link with her ancestors (and therefore mine) who may have crossed the border from North Wales into England to find work.
My mother knew none of this.
But it is good enough for me to continue with the notion that I have Welsh blood in me.













Jessie and Reg, my Grandfather in 1920. Jessie died of cancer in 1931, when my mother was 7 years old.

And why may you ask has this Welsh fervour materialised today? Well, the rugby season is upon us and Wales are doing rather well; last week they beat The English and this week it was The Scots who crumpled under their might.

Just to hear the Welsh anthem is enough to make one feel the need to be Welsh.

This is a translation of the chorus - it doesn't really scan of course, but the Welsh language would mean nothing to almost all my dear readers - and most would find it unpronounceable. Mind you it is lovely to hear the Welsh language and Ekatarina can pronounce it beautifully, though is not fluent - despite many of her lessons being in Welsh.

Land! Land!
I am true to my land!
As long as the sea serves as a wall
for this pure, dear land
May the language endure for ever.
Old land of the mountains,
paradise of the poets,
Every valley, every cliff a beauty guards;
Through love of my country,
enchanting voices will be
Her streams and rivers to me.

And now for a couple of pictures of the beautiful land itself.












Here is a view from near the summit of Snowdon in a most ethereal light, silhouetting me and one of the boys.

And here is a more recent picture sent to me by Pete of a hillside close to their home.

What wonderful colours!
From all of this you may gather that I have not, in fact, been out of the house today - but my heart has taken me "home".