The Diolch! Thank you! thread

Mach would be lovely in the very near future. I love Caffi Alys.

Cafe Cletwr a few miles down the road would also be a great one :slight_smile:

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Just to say diolch I @aran for the thought on a refresher based on all of the challenges. I think that- or something like it would really help me based on the slight weaknesses that I have found in myself especially when making up my own sentences (e.g in the speaking practices).

Alternatively, I could get off my backside and perhaps compile my own voice recording summary, perhaps based on snippets from all of the vocabulary entries for ā€œpatterns introducedā€.

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It sounds to me as though the best approach for this would be to re-visit the last couple of lessons of each level (Level 1 24 and 25, Level 2 24 and 25, etc) once a month or so - and to do the latest listening exercise on a daily basis - but otherwise, to put everything you can into getting into one-on-one conversations for as long as possibleā€¦ :slight_smile:

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I would like to say a big DIOLCH to the SSiW Forum community for being patient with me and DIOLCH for continuing to keep this place a vibrant, friendly, helpful and interesting place for Welsh learners to be. You are always so dedicated and passionate.

Unfortunately Iā€™ve been skiving off and ignoring my duties to this forum and all its users and embarrassingly havenā€™t been around here for quite some time. As you can imagine, I havenā€™t been otherwise idle, but when you drop your juggling balls you should pick them straight up and keep working hard at it, right?

So please accept my apology and letā€™s see if I can do a better job at this.

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Not at all, Catrin.
As I mentioned on another thread, it was great for my wife, Glenda and me to see you and Aran on wide screen TV only yesterday (SSIW U-tube) :slight_smile:

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I feel we should apologiseā€¦ :flushed:

:wink:

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Another quick Diolch from me:
@henddraig & @MarilynHames
I accidentally happened upon your Past Tense thread, when searching on Britania or something.

Anyway, in addition to the help with on, nes and wedi types, what powerful life stories both of you ladies have to share.

As I said - Diolch from me.

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Well, diolch. But Iā€™ve forgotten that exchange!

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Welcome home ā€¦ :slight_smile:

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Continuing my chronological diolch posts I want to express my Diolch to Pete (@Pete2), on here too, even though he doesnā€™t post on the forum for quite a long time now. So my nineteenth thank you is devoted to him for his hugely helpful role on my learning path.

He is even nowdays the huge inspiration especially as he became, just like @novem and @Nicky did, fluent (I can firmly say this) in a very short time. He is always willing to help and gives advise in any learning situation. I see him as fearless Welsh speaker - fearless in tearms of speaking - what boosts my confidence too.

Diolch o galon Pete for help and inspiration on my learning path and everything youā€™ve done and still do for me to be a better learner and speaker of this beautiful language which Welsh is.

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Ahh, it is always delight to post in this thread and thatā€™s why Iā€™ve come already to my twentieth thank you post in my chronology of learning. Yup all these people were huge help on my learning path and ā€¦ Well,m they didnā€™t stop comming toward me even today though.

Here we go ā€¦ The story continues like this:

@BronwenLewis one day has sent me a PM with request for doing a short Skype session as she is not (so she claimed) any near to be confident to speak. Am I willing to give her a bit of help with this? This was pleasant surprise for me and of course we were in Skype session in next days. She stated later on that I helped her to gain that so needed confidence she could finally go out in the wilderness and speak Cymraeg she learnt.

But she maybe isnā€™t aware that as much as I might help her, that much she helped me. Not with the confidence, it was plenty of it on my side of things but with everything else. Although Iā€™ve spoken to quite some people through Skype until that time I still feared sometimes I wonā€™t understand things. @aran usually is speaking slowly and is determined to do a lot of things in order to one could understand him, @brigitte is so patient speaking parther especially when comming to listening that I sometimes fear she really struggles to understand what I tend to say and @margaretnock also puts in a lot of effort in order one would understand her, this much I knew already but I was until that time total stranger to Bronwen so was she to me.

So, thank you Bronwen in deed for pulling me out of my comfort zone and put me on the test. Iā€™ve learnt that time that I can be understood perfectly with my many times totally incorrectly spoken hwntw and this was one of those moments which pushed me on. I didnā€™t have any clue at that time yet that Iā€™ll spend the whole week in the company of you and other bootcampers but I knew even after that Skype sesssion that thereā€™s no stopping point in order to go into the wild and speak language for me. Even not knowing Iā€™m comming to Wales I knew Iā€™m ready for the miracle to happen named Bootcamp.

Diolch yn fawr iawn ā€¦

Oh, when you come to Bled next time again? :slight_smile:

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Iā€™m still not sure why youā€™re thanking me, when you were the one who gave me the confidence to start using my Welsh! I canā€™t thank you enough for that.

And while Iā€™m here, I want to thank my new Ffrindiaith for helping me get me off the plateau Iā€™d been dozing on for some time. Thanks to her (slightly scary) attentions, Iā€™ve agreed to start reading Golwg (which is FAR too hard for me), to join Merched y Wawr (with @helenlindsay holding my hand) and to stop saying ā€˜bod ā€¦ maeā€™ immediately. Iā€™m also joining a Meistroli class which will be FAR too advanced for me, and if all that doesnā€™t kill me, thereā€™s always the local Welsh-language beetle driveā€¦

A special thank-you to her, and to all the other Ffrindiaith going the extra mile to help us become confident Welsh speakers.

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I love all of this!!! Who needs that comfort zone thingy?! Feeling comfortable with uncomfortable is the way to progress sometimes.

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Maybe because I still canā€™t thank you enough for helping me survive that strolling around at the bootcamp in Castell Newyd Emlyn. I would be hungry and angry not knowing what to eat if there wouldnā€™t be you with me. :slight_smile:

Siriously again, you did a lot more for me than you are aware of so thatā€™s why that ā€œthank youā€ and beyond that. :slight_smile:

YES THIS! :slight_smile:

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My thanks go firstly to my husband,who found me the ssiw app back in June when I first mused the possibility of learning Welsh. And he has supported me every since, having me chattering away to myself (well,aran and katrin really) in another room. Listening to me practise my newly learned words and sentences on him,and then explaining in English what said as he doesnā€™t speak Welsh. He helped me pick up when I was thinking that I could never do it, and he encouraged me to speak Welsh to others when I had last my cottage, without him I never would have carried on. So Thankyou Chris.
My second Thankyou goes to aran and the ssiw team. I have just finished the new and the old courses, and i couldnā€™t have done it without you either. Thankyou. I feel that I can now speak Welsh.
I will aim to build up confidence in speaking with others. Try to follow all your advice. Keep it up everyday. Think in Welsh, speak Welsh whenever I can.
Not sure if this is the place to put this,sorry if itā€™s not.
Jan
Ps. Have you had any pictures of yellow cats and dogs yet?:joy:

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Oops courage not cottagešŸ˜±

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Wow - HUGE congratulations - thatā€™s a heck of an achievement in 9 months! :star: :star2:

We do in fact have one rather beautiful mosaic yellow cat made by Lyn, @karengoā€™s mother-in-lawā€¦! :slight_smile:

There was a bootcamp in the south of Wales in July of the year 2016, as it is every year for quite a while now but that one was something special to me. Why? Simply because I was there among the participants of it. Just a month or two before I couldnā€™t even dream Iā€™d ba able to attend one of these so famous through the SSiW community bootcamps but the faith obviously wanted me there and I canā€™t be grateful for this opportunity enough.

It was all magnificent experience; the places weā€™ve visited, the people weā€™ve met, the happenings and activities weā€™ve done and most of all there was this bunch of magnificent bootcampers and Ap Dafydd family who made (and always makes Iā€™m sure) the bootcamp more than just a wonderful experience of living through the medium of Welsh.

So this, already twenty first Diolch post goes to all who were with me on this bootcamp in July of unforgetable year of 2016. Thank you little Anna, @AnthonyCusack, @brigitte, @BronwenLewis, Cat, @hectorgrey, @Deborah-SSi, @ElkieDeadman, Elliw, Gwenllian, @Iestyn, @Isata, Katie, Lynne , @margaretnock Mark and Vicky. You are amazing people and I am delighted to know you all.

Special thanks to Vicky, who has driven me to Cardiff after the bootcamp, where I had magnificent almost a week afterbootcamp experience with Eisteddfod and more. To Margaret and her husband who have me in their house for lunch and later on Margaret has taken me to Tresaith with her car. To Anthony who generously offered me the drive to Cardiff too but due to some missunderstandings I then have gone with Vicky and for offering me a place to stay during my visit to Cardiff if Iā€™d have nowhere to stay that afterbootcamp week. To Iestyn, Cat and their kids who bared with me all this week. I hope I wasnā€™t of any trouble though ā€¦ And to Dee who along with Margaret attended our Noson Llawen both of them enriching it with their own performances. That sudden call in Llandysul ā€œTatjana!ā€ from Dee that day earlier when we visited the city (sorry @sam84, I neglect to call it a village) will always be in my memory ā€¦ And to Mark who gave me that black stone he found on the Tresaith beach. It always goes with me wherever I go and is a (living) proof I was there ā€¦ In magnificent Tresaith! :slight_smile:

Actually all of you - dear July 2016 bootcampers deserve a special thanks ā€¦ So special thanks to all!

Diolch am y bopeth! Because of you too I still am going on!

Hwyl fawr!
Tatjana :slight_smile:

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Well Tatjana it wouldnā€™t have been half the experience without you! It was an absolute pleasure to spend the week with you and the crew!!

Diolch o galon!!!

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ā€˜The comfort zone thingyā€™? I think we all need it. Itā€™s just a matter of how big it is. Too small and itā€™s really just a prison. Big enough, and the world is your oyster. Iā€™m a bit disappointed to discover that I canā€™t find a reference to Oscar Wilde saying there were only two things to be avoided, namely incest and shellfish, but if he didnā€™t say it he should have done. And even then I would just avoid, 100%, the former.

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