Seren yr Wythnos | Star of the Week

AnthonyCusack · March 31, 2017, 1:52pm

@Deborah-SSi was so friendly when she visited us at bootcamp. I really enjoyed learning about the work she’d done in universities and talking about New Zealand. That was a very brief meeting. Since then she’s accepted a friend request on Facebook (may not seem much but means a lot) and I’ve really enjoyed staying in touch that way.

I have seen first hand the hard work Dee puts into the eisteddfod. Unfortunately, I ended up being a bit useless as none of my attempts to connect with sponsors worked. But Dee didn’t show any frustration. She met it all with enthusiasm.

I look forward to booking her spare room in Llandysul (Emma is keen, we just need to sit down and do it).

It’s so inspiring to meet people like Dee who have learnt Welsh. It brings it home how wonderful this community and project is that it attracts people like Dee.

Dw i’n edrych ymlaen at dy weld di eto

aran · March 31, 2017, 2:18pm

Omaigod omaigod omaigod I completely forgot to mention the SSiW Eisteddfod! Argghgghghggh.

Dee, can you go back up there and re-read it and this time imagine that you can see stuff about the Eisteddfod in it?..

BronwenLewis · March 31, 2017, 3:32pm

I wrote to Dee last year to ask for some advice about preparing for Bootcamp. I was surprised to get an immediate long, helpful reply, which ended with the encouraging words, ‘There is always someone there to help you.’ That proved to be true, and it was a real pleasure to meet Dee herself, as she was just as encouraging as you would expect from her newsletters and contributions to the forum. My goal is to become more like Dee as my Welsh improves….

Pete2 · March 31, 2017, 3:58pm

Is this in the gpc?

if not it blydiwelsiwdbu

HuwJones · March 31, 2017, 4:19pm

Dee is definitely my favourite Kiwi. Her consistent and crucial work for SSiW and support for its members are always visible and universally appreciated.

I have known her since the inaugural bootcamp seven years ago when I learned of two other of her talents. The first is her command of Esperanto and the second is her extraordinary bodily flexibility. I learned this during a bout of Twister in Tresaith. I retired early being unable to tell my pen ôl from my elbow, but she emerged victorious by being able to place her left ear, right knee and left ankle at the corners of the mat.

She exudes warmth and kindness and I hope to feel that warmth again soon.

Pete2 · March 31, 2017, 4:22pm

Its easily done pen ôl and penelin ! Add pen glin into the mix and it’s no wonder twister becomes difficult!

And as for @Deborah-SSi (can you tell i’m due to start a new teaching job). Newsletter that has praised my fledgling cymraeg, pushed my selfishly organised minibwtcamps and keeps me informed.

And who else would offer a place to stay so readily.

gruntius · March 31, 2017, 5:53pm

100% the correct choice and I’ve just remembered that I forget to mention @Deborah-SSi in my input in the “thank you” thread how could I overlook her? I think Dee was one of the first SSiWers I spoke to and her enthusiasm was evident then and still is today. I have to admire her grasp of languages too, a true polyglot if ever there was one.

Thank you @Deborah-SSi for all that you have ever done for this wonderful community.

aran · March 31, 2017, 6:46pm

Snap…

Omaigod I forgot to mention the Esperanto and polyglottery too

tatjana · March 31, 2017, 6:53pm

And I’ll be less and less talkative about sêr as I’ll probably “know” them less and less.

But let’s try this week to remain within my style anyway …

@Deborah-SSi
SSi newswoman who always manages to pick just the right news for the weekly newsletter. Reading her newsletters you’ll never remain uninfurmed. You’ll know (mostly) everything you need and her letters are always put together that way that you just have to peer into the forum after reading them and see/read more. Even when I sometimes somehow thought (according to forum activities) there’s not much to report she (to my surprise) always managed to put together great amount of information which are not just informative but also pleasant to read. The news are always put together in kind and warming style praising people for what they did, acheaved and encouraging others to get involved too

Polyglot with capital P in deed. Once I’ve spoken with Dee via Skype and we talked about languages (among all the other things) and I was impressed. It seamed to me she’d really like to know each and every language of this world. At that time she told me she’s tried some Turkish but who knows if there’s not the next few languages in the queue to try already. Her passion for Esperanto is remarcable and I know she’d be happy if more people would speak that language again. And her passion for Welsh! I never thought about her as a learner especially when I heard her speaking. I always thought she’s a native welsh speaker

SSiW online Eisteddfod organizer who did huge amount of work (according to what I’ve read on the forum Eisteddfod thread) this year too despite her health difficulties and the fact that she couldn’t be as engaged into the whole event as she was previous years. I’ve participated in the event only this year with small (not too good) entry but I felt like I’m a part of something great thanks to Dee aswell.

I know Dee from the forum and newsletter she puts together every week and I met her at the Bootcamp twice so I can’t say I know her very well, but she was always inspiration to me. I was more then happy when I saw her for the first time in Llandysul during our visit there. I still remember how she called my name and I looked puzzled and surprised who might know me there except of fellow bootcampers. She saw my surprised look and said “It’s me, Dee, Tatjana.” and I was thankful to this world I see her there as it was just short time after her medical treatment we visited there. Dee you will never know how happy I really was to see you and I was even happier when you visited us at Noson Lawen and took part too. I didn’t have much chance to talk with Dee but the amount of time we spent in the conversation is more then precious to me. As @AnthonyCusack is, I’m thankful nad happy too that she accepted me into her circle of FB friends.

Dee, you’re real star of SSi with your warmth, passion for language and kind attitude toward each and everyone of us, always willing to help and encourage those who need to be encouraged.

I salute you! You are and of SSi!

brigitte · March 31, 2017, 7:24pm

I appreciate Dee for the superb work for the newsletter, organizing the SSiW Eisteddfod, for being always a friendly, supportive friend on the forum but I always remember her how I visited Wales for the first time, in 2010 with my daughter and a friend, Dee was the first Welsh speaker I met. She arranged to meet us in the Mochyn Du. Speaking with her was like speaking to a long known friend ( I still feel embarrassed, because I couldn’t stick to Welsh but switched to English).
The second was Aran and at last I met @dafyddyfelin. They all were so helpful and patient with me and they made me keep on learning Welsh.
So diolch o galon i ti, Dee, the first person who addressed me in Welsh.

CatrinLliarJones · April 1, 2017, 12:25pm

The first thing you will notice about Dee is her warm, sparkling smile, because that is how she greets everyone she meets.

Dee is one of the gentlest and most compassionate people I know. She cares about people and in return, people care about her. She is kind, thoughtful, unselfish and always friendly.

Her enthusiasm and loyalty towards SSiW and all its members knows no bounds. She has worked so hard over the years to help wherever and whenever she can to make this forum a better place.

I admire Dee greatly. She has the kind of strength we all wish we had and never fails to bring happiness to your day whenever you see her, despite her own worries and challenges.

Diolch, Dee am bopeth ti wedi ei wneud ac yn parhau i wneud i SSiW. Ti wirioneddol yn seren aur. XXX

netmouse · April 1, 2017, 12:34pm

Diolch Dee, for everything you do supporting SSIW, Welsh in general and people in general! You are clearly one of those multiply-wonderful people who make the world a better place! I hope we’ll meet one of these days…

Deborah-SSi · April 1, 2017, 8:11pm

I have gone through several emotions reading this comments - from bursting out laughing at @hewrop’s comment on the Twister game (I never realised how much it stuck in your mind!), to feeling a bit teary and embarrassed at some of the other comments.

I also laughed reading @aran’s comment on Danielle’s internal mail at the BBC which I’d totally forgotten about. I can’t remember exactly how it came about now, but she was couchsurfing in my Cardiff flat at the time so she had no choice but to hear me practising my SSiW lessons in the evening and she did pick up a few words herself.

I seem to have been born with a love of languages and other cultures, so it was something very natural to me to immerse myself in the Welsh language and culture since I arrived here. I couldn’t imagine living here and not doing so. I was just ever so glad to find SSiW and be able to make my dream of becoming a Welsh speaker a reality. I know I would have got there in the end, as I am a determined sort of person underneath, but it would have been so much slower, and nowhere near as much fun! Getting to know the Fab Four, plus loads of SSiWers, has made my life in Wales even more special.

So thank you for all the comments. It’s lovely to know that you appreciate things like the newsletter and the Online Eisteddfod, and if they in any way contribute to your enjoyment of your Welsh learning, then it’s all really worthwhile.

And I hope to meet as many of you as possible, either on bootcamp, at the SSiW birthday party, at a National Eisteddfod sometime, or to welcome you to Llandysul if you’d like to stay with me through AirBnB and have a holiday speaking Welsh.

Diolch yn fawr!

AnnaC · April 1, 2017, 9:53pm

@Deborah-SSi was the person I thanked in the “Diolch” thread this week (link to Diolch thread) so I won’t repeat it all here, except to say that Dee totally deserves to be Seren yr Wythnos! Thanks again for all you do, Dee!

markwatkinprice · April 5, 2017, 9:31am

Although I have only met Dee briefly, I must echo the sentiments about her enthusiasm and general loveliness. And thank you, Dee for all those reminders about updating the forum about meetups - organisation was never my strong suit and without a doubt, you have kept the Cacen meetups in the public eye. Thank you Dee.

davidneale · April 5, 2017, 12:35pm

I’d like to thank everyone who has a hand in the running of SSIW for their dedication to the Welsh language and Welsh culture and for offering the opportunity to people around the world to share their obvious joy in simply being Welsh. Your work should be recognised at a national level at least.

Diolch yn fawr i chi.

aran · April 7, 2017, 11:54am

Well done - you’ve got through another week! It’s Friday!

Seren yr Wythnos #5

Spenny

Spenny (or @ianspencer as he’s more properly and less commonly known) isn’t on the forum all that often these days - which makes him a particularly good example of how I’d like this thread to recognise all the people in the SSiW ecosystem - especially the ones you might otherwise not have known about their contributions.

Now, it would be easy to choose Spenny as Seren yr Wythnos for his courage in facing up to the very first ever Bootcamp with only about 10 sessions under his belt - and for surviving the week by miming ‘sunny’ and ‘hat’ any time he wanted to say ‘syniad da’…

Or we could choose him for his long-standing friendliness and consistent, calm support and advice - Catrin and I have always enjoyed catching up with Spenny when he’s over in Gwynedd, and it was an absolute delight to see him again recently at the Llandrindod reunion of The Magnificent Saith (our first Bootcampers).

But, no, it’s going to have to be Seren yr Wythnos to Spenny for…

Actually Making SSiW Possible

Yes, I’ll explain.

Back in the day, when we had about one or two thousand learners, and Course 1 and the beginning of Course 2, all of which were free, we also had quite a few people telling us we ought to be charging for the course.

Spenny was one of the clearest of those voices (I’ll never forget his ‘banging head against wall in despair’ tone when I told him we were going to charge £95 for the week for our first Bootcamp!).

But we had a problem.

We didn’t like the idea of charging lots of money for SSiW - it was clear it was working, but we want to help build a successful future for the Welsh language, and that doesn’t mean turning people away because they can’t afford to learn.

So the only pattern that looked okay to us was a very low monthly subscription - but then surely that meant people would subscribe, download the Course 2 lessons, and then realise that they were subscribing for nothing, feel a bit silly, and cancel the subscription?

We needed something that would be new and valuable every month, or every week.

And then I got an email from Spenny.

It went something like this:

‘These recordings you make. Would you like me to build a tool that would put them all into a database, so that you could take less time stitching them up into lessons? And then you’d be able to pull bits of them out at random for revision purposes…’

And that was the beginning of the Spennyware - a gigantically brilliant software tool which is the base of everything we’ve done - donated, for free, by a superb software engineer (the guy who literally wrote the book on C++) just to say ‘thank you’.

It made the daily practice sessions possible - and that made the subscription approach possible - and that lead a few years later to the point where Ifan and I are full-time, and the Spennyware has grown via the Jennyware (more later) into the SSiBorg, and started moving online, and opening up all sorts of interesting new possibilities (more later!).

If I had to choose one moment when the fate of SSiW genuinely rested in the balance, I think I’d choose the moment Spenny sent me that email, and landed himself with a moderately enormous software project on the side.

Heaven alone knows how much we would have needed to find if we’d tried to get something like that done on the open market - far, far more than we could ever have afforded.

So, you lovely folks of SSiW - if you’ve ever used any of our lessons (and not entirely hated the process!) now would be a good time to say thank you to Spenny…

Seren yr Wythnos #1

Iestyn ap Dafydd

Seren yr Wythnos #2

Catrin Lliar Jones

Cat Dafydd

Dee McCarney

Spenny

Jeff Lewis