Hi, firstly, I’m just loving this course - I “learned” Welsh around 15 years ago so that my husband and kids couldn’t have those secret conversations(!) and after teaching a dosbarth nos cwrs for a year or two, have been overseas for a few years. I’m trying now to brush off my welsh and a couple of things I noticed and would love confirmation on:
rhaid i fi, eisiau i fi = I was taught to use “mi” and even my truly Welsh husband from Sir Benfro uses “mi” - has this changed during our absence?
I would like - this was hoffwn i for me (a fy ngwr) but challenge 4 i’m sure is using hoffen i - or is that just my ears?
The southern course is Welsh as spoken by Iestyn, who comes from the valleys near Cardiff if memory serves. Therefore some of how he speaks Welsh will be different to how your husband speaks it, because there are a lot of regional differences even between nearby villages. Personally, I would suggest just using the Welsh you already know for various sentences; neither you nor the course are wrong, just different.
Croeso nôl i’r Gymraeg, Kate - welcome back to Welsh!
Just to confirm what everyone is saying:
rhaid i mi / eisiau i mi to my ear, and (importantly) in my accent, ssounds quite formal. Other areas, however (especially in the north, and presumably at least parts of Pembrokeshire) use it naturally. Use whichever suits you, and if you find yourself using the “wrong” one (especially in lessons), just congratulate yourself on the flexibility of your Welsh!
As for hoffen / hoffwn, that is ourely a valleys thing. Correct grammatical Welsh, and everywhere other than the South East says hoffwn i, then hoff-et ti / -en ni / -ech chi / -en nhw, but in the south east, we’ve sort of reverse engineered the endings so that the e goes all the way through. The only minor confusion that might arise if you copy me in that, while having a different accent in otehr things is that hoffen i and hoffen ni are identical to the ear. But in 30 odd years of talking to people not-from-where-I-am, I’ve never knowingly been misunderstood.
So, don’t worry (that’s the SSiW mantra), and plough on - you certinainly seem to have the ear for the Welsh, so I’m guessing that you will pick things back up rapidly as you work your way through the course.
perffaith - o’n i’n just yn panic tipyn bach achos bod fy nhad (sy’n siarad y Cymraeg dysgodd e ail iaith yn yr ysgol, blynyddau yn ol) yn swnio yn hen fasiwn pan mae e’n dweud pethau fel “yr wyf fi …”, o’n i ddim eisiau bod fel 'na!!
diolch yn fawr iawn am y cwrs, mae’n arbennig o dda :))
I too was wondering about those “fi” and “mi” after “Rhaid i”. I was “used” (hm…) to choose the “mi” form, with SSW lesons (northern for my part), and was surprised to see only “fi”, as a standard, in TJ Rhys Jones Welsh A complete course for beginners", that I like to use because he was translated in French, and sometimes, it is a REAL and TRUE “rest” not to have to pass through the English to understand the Welsh !..
A Northern Welsh speaker friend of mine told me that this TJ Rhys Jones use of “Fi” was for him a bit surprising. He said : " The only real time that Fi is for English Me, is if somebody says “Who did (something)?” and someone answers (English) : “Me”
So : “Pwy wedi canu” ?" (“Who sang ?”) ?Answer “Y fi”. ( “Me”, or “I did”). Otherwise, “*rhaid i mi”."
Anyway, as in Breton I guess, there are a lot of differences between “what should be” in a “purely linguistic way” and what is said here and there, depending of regions, young or less young speakers, tongue levels, accents which finally impact the writing… : that’s why tongues are so marvelous and… such a never-ending stoty to learn !!!
Fi is used a lot in SW Wales. First language school pupils and my teacher friends use it, so I feel ok with it as and now find myself using it as an alternative to I:
Mae fy mam fi yn byw yn Newcastle on fi’n byw yn Abertawe.
