My dictionary app has that as ‘Maintenance’! More filling in a pothole than resurfacing the road!
Yes, It is a highways maintenance depot that was also used as a base during some projects when bends were straightened out , so improvement in terms of the layout, really. I think that was the English version, so take your pick.
Incidentally, for anyone like me who feels the need to pin point the location: Near Peniel (N of Carmarthen) and near the cottage that had the Catalan flag for a while; now changed back to the Welsh flag (Y Ddraig Goch.)
just seen a sign in a shop in Llanelli with a Welsh translation that’s thrown me - any help.
the English is - battery low, charge your device here
the welsh is - bateri isel, gw frwch ich fei na
apart from bateri isel, and the loosely spelt ich for eich, I’m stumped.
got to say, I’m certainly stumped too!
GPC has gwefraf ‘to electrify’, but I can’t come up with anything better than dyfáis.
It was in Primark (don’t ask) and it was words with a handpainted effect on the wall. Should have took a photo. I now think Richard is right and it was meant to be gwefrwch for charge, but they missed out the “e”. They had missed one of the eich.
As for fei na - no idea whatsoever.
Could it be fel 'ma, meaning, loosely, ‘here’ sort of ‘at here’? Or fel 'na… ‘at there’? Or even ‘like this’??
Couldn’t they find a single Welsh speaker among their ranks? What am I saying? This was Primark… they may struggle to find a fluent English speaker among their ranks!
To be fair to them they had Welsh plastered prominently all over the place and most of it made sense. I thought this one was ultra colloquial and was keen to find out what gw and frwch meant. It makes you wonder if they actually employ anyone who speaks Welsh though.
A lot of people working there and other like places are part time paying their way through higher education. [quote=“Toffidil, post:4198, topic:3153”]
It makes you wonder if they actually employ anyone who speaks Welsh though.
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Probably not specifically but they also wouldn’t not employ someone because they can so on average …
I find that Primark does make more of an effort than most companies to make Welsh prominent in their stores to be fair. For example , their signage is bilingual and their till announcements are in Welsh first before English. I have never managed to get served in Welsh there though . You do hear a lot of Welsh spoken in Primark Llandudno which shows that people travel from the Welsh speaking areas further away to shop there .
Sort of random Sunday Afternoonish post:
Officially it is pronounced Praimark (Preimark). Swansea: Preemark (S Wales “I” sound); S Carms: Primmark (as in Trimsaran) What about elsewhere?
Ive only ever heard preemark, Pontypridd, Newport, Cardiff or Swansea.
Reminds me of Adidas - always been Adeedas to me and a mate of mine from Merthyr used to get a bit annoyed with anyone who said Ad id as and I imagine he has probably gone a bit loopy now since that is what is heard on TV all the time these days.
I say Adee das and pree mark and come from northern Wales…its probably a Welsh thing as my English gf thought it was funny first time she heard me pronounce them…
While Primark are a tad better at using Welsh … compared to other countries in Europe…it is total tokenism.
I have products I buy (in Wales) with 10 European languages written on the packaging … as obscure as Slovenian…and yet they tell me that putting Welsh on products has no demand grr.
Saw this phrase…need confirming!
“sydd wedi hen ddiflannu” … I understood as “that have long disappeared” (It was a book about how landscapes that give our communities their names are usually long destroyed or converted)
Can I use “wedi hen/ hen” in front of verbs to mean long?
wedi hen fynd? long gone? (obviously hen causes soft mutation hence fynd)
Need help
yup, pretty much. Handy isn’t it?
Another idiom where it’s also handy - mae’n hen bryd, meaning “it’s high time” (e.g. mae’n hen bryd i mi golchi’r llestri)
Diolch!
ISTR that “hen” is used in a few other idiomatic expressions I have come across now and again.
Can’t remember them now of course, but it seems like “hen” is a pretty handy word to have around, over and above its literal meaning.