Well, I was at the SSIW party on Saturday (which was great- thanks again to Dee, Aran and Iestyn), and I don’t know if it was how things turned out or if it was representative, but I spoke to more people who live outside of Wales than in Wales. I’ve wanted to do a page on parallel.cymru for a while that will help people find locations where they can use the language, as to my knowledge the large organisations haven’t done so. Anyway, seeing how much effort so many people have put into learning the language gave me the kick up the bum to get going, so on Sunday I started this page:
https://parallel.cymru/siarad.
It’s a map-based overview of places which should be staffed by speakers or learners. I’ve got ~100 listings so far, but I’m sure there are many more to be added. It’s arranged by category, and it works fine on tablets and mobiles.
Although the page exists now, I’m not planning on publicising it till the weekend, but I thought that SSIWers might want to have an early preview, suggest locations and provide feedback.
Please note that I’m not looking to put general businesses, meetups, or adhoc events on there; the volume of listings would get too large to curate as a volunteer and it would get progressively out of date.
Let me know your thoughts!
I was visiting the Criccieth area last week and there were a few places you could add to the map - Tir a Mor restaurant/cafe in Cricieth had Welsh speaking staff (one of which very kindly went up the street to hand me a hat I had left behind)The David Lloyd George museum in Llanystumdwy had a sign on the counter saying you could speak Welsh to the staff. Portmeirion is on the map for festival no 6 but could probably have its own listing as lots of the staff were speaking it, the guided tour was in English but the guide did say a brief bit at the end in Welsh and the Italian restaurant I went to on the site Caffi Glas had a fully bilingual menu in Welsh then English and Welsh speaking staff.
Hi @cap, thanks very much for this! I’ve added them now. I’ve never managed to get to Portmeirion yet, but would love to, especially now that I could receive services there through Welsh.
The page is going well- over 250 listings now, and was on Golwg 360 and Radio Cymru on Monday. If anyone else has listings, most welcome to let me know!
Hi Neil, great resource, as is the Parallel website which regretfully I’ve never delved into properly until now, many thanks!
No problem Sylv, happy that people are making use of it! 