Well, here i go with my take on things discussed in another thread. (hope i don’t offend anyone).
Were we fluent in the whole welsh language, absolutely not and that will probably still be true in five years time.
What has SSIW given us.
Well, tonight everyone who took part was definitely fluent with what they have learnt (and keen to add more by helping each other), They could all go out shopping or for a meal in Caernarfon and get by.
Sometimes i have to stop and double check that i was part of several people from different countries managing to converse in a second language.
Sure, we all want to get better, but conversation flowed. do i need to say more.
I’d like to thank @seren for asking me what had happened there recently, after I mentioned that I had just been watching the recent episode when the group call started
This morning I was wondering (not very charitably, perhaps) whether it was real curiosity or just a cunning ploy to get me to speak more after I had said nothing in the call for quite a while. At any rate, thanks all for listening, and I did enjoy having a topic about which I could speak a bit, thank you for drawing me out!
You think too highly of me:) It was a cunning way to get a man talk about the intricate relationships of fictional characters - and it was very fun, thank you.
On a more serious note, I think that TV-series provide a very good topic for conversation and can be a fun away to practice an incredible amount of vocabulary on such topics as family, jobs, relationships, travelling, appearance, character and all that in a natural context like “So what about the blonde Southern girl who’s waiting for a baby, how’s she doing?”
I think one small problem with group skyping is that there are always people who know each other well and know each other’s jobs, families and hobbies, and there are new people who feel, perhaps, a bit “alien to this feast” (as we say in Russia). Maybe we should all watch or read something we could talk about?
Thank you everyone for the skype call yesterday, it was lovely to see you and it made me feel a little bit more confident about myself. @Pete2, nice to meet you! I didn’t get to talk to you for long, but I did notice you speak very fast:)
So my thoughts were not unjustified after all Well, I didn’t notice at the time, nor do I mind, really – thank you again for the speaking prompt and for being able to talk about something I “knew about”, though I felt I was struggling with vocabulary a fair bit! Thank you all for your patience
Indeed – it was a lot more natural than having to say similar things in response to some grammar prompt or other, or in a make-believe situation such as “Imagine that you are a woman who just had a baby and whose mother-in-law is getting on your nerves; what you would say and how would you feel?”.
Because this way, my sentences – while still good grammar and vocabulary practice – were fulfilling a real communicative purpose (or so I thought ) and so it didn’t feel artificial or like “just work” (conjugating the verbs, arranging sentences). Plus, as you said, it was new information rather than participants’ backgrounds which many may already know.
Incidentally, what was the word you used for “blonde”? I thought I heard “gwallt coch” or something like that, but she doesn’t have red hair… but “Southern girl who’s expecting a baby” was clear enough to let me know whom you meant. (I don’t know the word for either “blonde” nor “hair”.)
Yep: i just could not of imagined being part of such a group a few years ago (da iawn SSiW).[quote=“seren, post:306, topic:3828”]
I think that TV-series provide a very good topic for conversation and can be a fun
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This seems to be true and i will catch up on a few episodes (learning/using the different relationship words would certainly increase my vocabulary).
A very good point and one with no clear answer other than assuring people not to worry about it,
New learners take note, i can remember feeling like i was stumbling on every sentence (and i sure still have a long way to go) but last night it seemed clear those i had spoken with in the past were using their welsh with more ease (conversation flowed).
2017 is off to a positive start, hooray.
For the girl who wanted time alone i suppose it’s ok to use something like (mae hi eisiau bod yn unig ar ei baban newydd hi). (yes, a lot of my welsh is gess work)!!
I should of taken note of the English words i dropped in the conversation so i could look up the welsh equivalent because i have forgotten what they were (ho hum paid a phoeni amdani).
I said “gwallt melyn” which is an expression I’d heard somewhere for describing a blonde woman. “Gwallt coch” I know very well, since I absolutely love red hair and sometimes it comes up in the conversations:)
It’s surprising, though, that I managed to be clear about the girl’s condition, since I don’t know the expression for being pregnant. Is there a polite idiomatic way to say that, something like “in the family way”?
I know this feeling - isn’t it just wonderful? Thank you “Rownd a Rownd”. I still miss “Dim ond y gwir” though. It was my favourite S4C series and it ended with a cliffhanger:(
Well, I hope I will get some other chance to talk to you in the future. )
I only maybe heard you for 5 minutes or so, but yes, it seemed to me that you were talking rather fast.
And it was “gwallt coch” you said @seren and I all of a sudden had very clear imagination of woman with long red hair although I never watched Rownd a Rownd. I see you really love red hair very much.
golau
gwallt
To be honest I knew “gwallt” but not “golau” despite I’ve already heard the word. I many times understand the word in the context but if you’d ask me what"s one single English word in Welsh I don’t garantie I’d know.
Well, soap drama isn’t my topic of conversation so here you’d see me being quiet but it’s fun to listen to people talking about it even more if it’s Cymraeg. Sadly I don’t watch any TV lately and not even S4C. But as @ramblingjohn says, there’s not to worry. This way everyone can come to the point of saying something.
To be honest, I was a bit annoyed with @philipnewton being quiet and that’s why I’ve said at one point he should say something. Seren came as a saviour with that questions about TV series.
geriadur says “beichiogrwydd” = pregnancy
and “beichiog” = pregnant
But, well I didn’t know that from my head either. For more idiomatic way to say that I don’t know either.
Well, I’m sorry too. Fun to speak with you.
Ooo, yes! Very really.
And at the end (as I’ve typed the post while reading) I see you’ve discussed all what I’ve just written but … ah what a heck … I’ll post this anyway.
Thanks for the interest Dee, i think we will stay as we are for now and see how it goes over time.
I don’t want anyone to feel excluded and will modify the list as necessary, but last night i put out the call to 9 people and we ended up with five taking part which was a good number to not have anyone feel excluded by the chat of others. (of course if you would like to atend and help with the missing words that would be great )
I’m expecting one more person next time, and when possible would be glad to fit someone new in, i’m more than happy if anyone wants to listen more than speak if that helps them gently into the chaos.
That’s fine then. I know it’s good with around 5 people, but I’m in a Skype group that sometimes gets up to 8 people and that tends to be too many. One or two dominate and the others don’t get a turn.
Diolch yn fawr for keeping this group going. It sounds very worthwhile.
That’s why I usually pay attention to who doesn’t get the turn in speaking and at one point of the conversation I just say as I did at this conversation “Phillip, dweud rhywbeth …?” what is usually answered with smile and then on that one just tends to say at least something. For the time being @seren came to rescue so @philipnewton unleashed his speaking abilities. I was impressed. So Phillip you just don’t leak in vocabulary so much as you think you are. I understood everything and perfectly celar knew what you want to say.
We were once thinking with John about starting a “reading club” where we could read “Blasu” all together and discuss the chapters but we didn’t do it for some reason.
That would still be very useful for those who wanted to take part, and there would be plenty of descriptive words that would be useful when talking about rownd a rownd.
This prompted me to look up the word for ‘character’ - cymeriad.
Mae’n debyg bydden ni’n defnyddio’r frawddeg, prif gymeriad ! - i suppose we would use the sentence main character ect.
) and so it didn’t feel artificial or like “just work” (conjugating the verbs, arranging sentences). Plus, as you said, it was new information rather than participants’ backgrounds which many may already know.
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