I have finished level 2and am now revising. I have never had anyone to practice with and I am finding things really difficult. I never get to speak Welsh with anyone else at all!
Problem is I can be pretty unreliable due to arthritis pain which can hit at any time, so I sometimes end up letting people down (particularly myself!)
Is there anyone in the Camberwell area of SE London who would be willing to put up with me?? to meet up occaisionally to Speak Welsh?
I am learning Southern Dialect
Tagging @peterallen and @KateM , they may have some more info for you regarding meetings in London.
If practicing online is something youâre not completely avoiding, youâd definitely benefit from joining our free Welsh Speaking Practice slack community. There you can find people for a practice chat from all over the world, either for one-on-one chats or scheduled group chats. If youâd like to join just send an email with the subject âWSPâ to admin@saysomethingin.com
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I know how you feel, I am coming to the end of Level 1. I have not had chance to practice with anyone. I live in the USA. My work schedule is not great as I work second shift and often get called in to work early. I have tried to schedule to get in a zoom chat on a Friday but so far my schedule has not matched up. I will perserver by myself and often talk to myself but it is hard to remember all of it.
On the Slack WSP group there is a channel especially for those in the Americas - you can join and chat in any channel of course, but the specific Americas channel helps with finding people in the same (or not quite so distant) time-zones - worth having a look at to see if that helps, as there are lots of learners in the USA.
I have emailed ssiw with the hope to finding someone either online or in person. Thanks
Are you able to get to central London Lorraine? If you can, the London Welsh centre in Grays Inn Road is a good place to speak Welsh.
I have tried to contact them on many occasions, both on the phone and by email. they promise to send emails but they never arrive!
There is a Cylch Siarad each Thursday at the LWC in the bar. It starts about 7.30pm and goes on for most of the evening. The Welsh choirs practice on that night too so the bar becomes lively when they finish. The LWC can be a bit dauting as they may have the front door closed on Thursdays but the intercom system goes to the bar with stairs up to the bar to the left as you enter. Lorraine - regarding the next Llon-dain, no plans as of yet.
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Just putting this here because I donât think my post deserves itâs own thread, and I donât like to be downbeat about learning Welsh. At the same time, itâs chewing me up a bit, partly because of slight stress and insomnia from other sources making my reactions disproportionate, and I think writing about it will help to draw out the sting. Youâre all language learners here too, and you know how you can have your bad moments/days/weeks.
Anyway, Iâve been emailing the translation department in my current and previous job exclusively in Welsh for almost four years now, and getting Welsh replies back. My written Welsh is obviously non-native and contains mistakes, but I think itâs okay for someone whoâs been learning for quite some time now as an adult (since October 2014, in fact).
Yesterday one of the translators wrote to me in English a couple of times to check details on a piece Iâd sent him. He switched back to Welsh to say âDyma feâ when it was being returned. I felt/feel very demoralised. I kept thinking he must think my Welsh is awful, a complete dogâs breakfast, if he canât bear to write back to me in Welsh. Iâve started using English now to email the translation team instead. : (
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Yes, @sortaottery, we all have experiences like that and it is demoralising. The man was probably just trying to be helpful, and not realising the effect he was having. (If he was deliberately trying to put you down then he is nasty and should be ignored, but I think that this is less likely.)
I hope that you can carry on as you were, e-mailing in Welsh, and put this behind you.
Best wishes,
Sue
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Thanks for kind words, Sue!
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I agree, my guess would be that he was trying to do you favour by not requiring you to respond in Welsh. He probably assumed that you email in Welsh because people expect you to or you feel you should, rather than because you want to.
I had a broadly similar experience many years ago as an adolescent on a school trip to France. We were there specifically to practice our French, but every time I opened my mouth people switched to English. Their intentions were good - they didnât realise they were defeating the object of me speaking to them!
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Thanks, Alan. It can be so frustrating when that happens. With German, people sometimes thought I was French/Serbian (donât know why), so didnât immediately switch to English, but when an eager store assistant did it cost me a lot to smile and not show the mortification. In person, I give off uneasy vibes - I was always getting pulled aside and searched in airport security when I still travelled abroad - so in person most Cymry Cymraeg assume theyâre being kind by using English.
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It may have been as simple as the translator was âthinkingâ in English when they wrote the email. The bilingual brain can be an odd thing! My 9yo is tri-lingual and people often say ooh how lovely to be able to switch effortlessly between three languages, whereas I can see itâs not effortless. Eg when he gets off the school bus where heâs been speaking Basque, and I greet him and ask about his day, I can see itâs a big effort to switch codes. Yet when I ask him the same question after heâs been watching Captain Underpants or whatever, the response is perfectly fluent!
I canât see why adults would be any different.
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Thanks, Robert, thatâs a good point. I know I sometimes walk out of Welsh class and say âdiolchâ etc. in shops without meaning to. Looked at your introductory post, btw. Really great that youâre learning Welsh, and to have a kid raised as a Basque speaker.
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I get very despondent about my Welsh too, but i think itâs too easy to let the odd little setback distract from the enormous progress we make.
A friend and I have a semi-regular meet up in the local pub so I can practice Basque. I was a bit early this week so sat reading a Lois Arnold nofel dysgwr. When my mate arrived, I could not think of a single word in Basque - only Welsh words came to mind. I think that counts as progress 
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Similar experiences here too! Our friends in France speak almost no English, so communication is always in French. All well and good until Iâve been brave enough to try out my Welsh on defenceless first-language locals here, and then can I get back to thinking in French? Can I thump! I canât tell my mynd from my aller, or my aros from my attendre - total linguistic brain seize.
Kind of glad to hear itâs not just me; was getting a bit worried about those advancing yearsâŚ
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No! I can still read French, but I can no longer remember a single word if I try to speak, because Welsh comes out instead.
Sue
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I came to the conclusion a while back that switching between languages is a skill like any other, and in order to be able to do it, it has to be practised. I still donât find it easy, but I have some memorised âtriggerâ sentences that I can recall quickly and they kickstart my brain into the right language.
E.g. if Iâm speaking in another language and someone suddenly wants me to speak Welsh, I think âDw iân mynd i siarad Cymraeg nawrâ and thatâs usually enough to reactivate the Welsh.
I still say things like âGracias i chiâ though like I did yesterday 
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I use (or try to) those prompt sentences too! With varying levels of success 
Reminds me of something - long before I decided to learn Welsh, when driving over to the UK and trying to remember what side of the road I was supposed to be on (which is easy until youâre lost or stressed!), Iâd think âCADWCH IâR CHWITHâ or even have it written on the dash - for some reason it kickstarts the brain better than if it were in English. Why Welsh? I remember seeing the phrase on a bridge roadsign on a holiday and it just stuck in my mind!
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