Mark’s son and family came over to Bala for the weekend ( I think I had 4 cousins those days!) and we took the children on the steam railway at the lake.
There was a short break and Alba and Rex ate the cheese sandwiches their mum had made for them. I wandered the platform with my camera.
The train driver, Peter, seemed really pleased to be asked for a photo. I wondered what the initials on his cap meant “Bala Lake Railway” he said.
Then I wondered why the guard had different initials on his cap “His are in Welsh” Peter said.
Yet another excellent portrait, Hazel. Llyn Tegid is the Welsh name for Bala Lake so the other guys cap would probably have the initials RLT: Rheilffordd Llyn Tegid. Its a bilingual country and has two official languages so mostly you would get both sets of initials on their uniforms. The Welsh initilas could be RhLlT because rh is a letter in its own right, as is ll
@quietpurplehaze There is a similarity between Welsh and Breton and their respective speakers can sometimes understand each other. There are a fair number of words of Latin origin too. Pronunciation can be a problem for those new to Welsh because the sounds of individual letters can be quite different to how they sound in English. W gets them because its a vowel in Welsh - pron, 'oo' - Y is a vowel too pron 'uh' or 'i' (both short vowels) as in Aberystwyth ('Aberustwith'). th as in thing, not as in that. Emphasis is usually on the penultimate syllable and the r is rolled, so Ab bear RUST with. The ll in Llyn is more difficult to explain: roll the l and breath through it at the same time. Sorry I'm rambling about things you don't need to know!
I am always interested in language, David. I noticed absence of vowels but now I know that w is one, also y. If I needed to learn Welsh it should have been a long time ago - too late now. The words I noticed on signs were pont (Welsh) = pont (French) and what fascinated me was eglwys (Welsh) = eglise (French) excuse my iPad’s lack of e acute accent. So I could read 2 Welsh words and guess their meaning but not attempt a conversation!
@quietpurplehaze Well spotted! Now you know about w and y you can see that there are more vowels in Welsh than in English Welsh also has a e i o and u... although it pronounces them differently
I'm interested in the little snippets you have fed me, thank you David but I think Welsh will remain largely a mystery to me. My cousin, having a house in Wales, seems to have absorbed a little of the language.
July 4th, 2019
Leave a Comment
Sign up for a free account or Sign in to post a comment.
Dianne, I'll see if I can get a badge made!! Thank you!
Yes, I wonder too!
Such a nice comment, thank you!
I liked that aspect too, although I did get a forward facing shot as well.
The steam railway just runs around the Lake at Bala. I liked the English/Welsh language divide between the driver's and the guard's headgear!
I think the Welsh was RLT. I was fascinated by Welsh on signs, sometimes a similarity to French.
I am always interested in language, David. I noticed absence of vowels but now I know that w is one, also y. If I needed to learn Welsh it should have been a long time ago - too late now. The words I noticed on signs were pont (Welsh) = pont (French) and what fascinated me was eglwys (Welsh) = eglise (French) excuse my iPad’s lack of e acute accent. So I could read 2 Welsh words and guess their meaning but not attempt a conversation!
I'm interested in the little snippets you have fed me, thank you David but I think Welsh will remain largely a mystery to me. My cousin, having a house in Wales, seems to have absorbed a little of the language.