now it can be told

[rm]

You know that thing I believe where sometimes it's only the future that explains the stuff that's happened in the past? And you know how I have this thing where my entire life tends to be governed by a really peculiar and relentless sort of serendipity?

Okay, so, get this:

So despite thinking there was just a very slim change of this happening (I know I've made vague noise about it to a few of you) it's now pretty much a done deal that Patty's next bit of international academic travel means she's going to be spending 10 or so weeks in Cardiff this fall.

Yeah, what are the odds of that, right?

We cannot stop laughing (and everything we find in random books about Cardiff, I'm like, "I think I used that in a story"), and we're going to have to learn how to pronounce things and OH GOD, I really need a winter coat that's not Jack's.

Also, to totally round this out for Torchtasticness -- Patty'll be in India for about the same period of time in early 2011, and I can visit her there too if we can make $$ and time work. Fandom, say it with me: Cardiff, Switzerland, India. This is my life.

Comments

[smirnoffmule.livejournal.com]

Sometimes I feel like you and I should just swap houses, because man it isn't fair. But then I suppose if you were going to do that, you could just swap with someone who actually lives in Cardiff.

Oh sure, but it's something you can easiest figure out while you are there and people from there are saying it for you. That and the rhythm of the rest, the kind of Welsh gutterfuck rhythm, that one.

Sure. This is not like aimed at you at all, I know this isn't you or anyone here, *but* there is this stereotype of Welsh being like impossible and unpronouncable, and this isn't always an entirely harmless thing, it's an excuse in some circles for a lot of othering and bigotry and xenophobia, which is why my kneejerk reaction is always to say, hey, it's not like an alien tongue is required or anything. Which I know is not you at all, but... if that kind of thing interests you, you might want to know that. And also, if you meet English people who insist they can't pronounce Ll even with coaching, the law will be on your side if you kick them in the shins.

[rm.livejournal.com]

Know you aren't directing this at me either, but I feel the need to note (and oddly, this ties back in relevance to yesterday's bullying conversation here): For me, I have extreme problems learning to pronounce sounds that don't exist in American English because of years of speech therapy, especially if these are words I'm using in an otherwise English language context (so, say, Australian vowel pronunciations that don't exist in the US, or Welsh place names in an otherwise English sentence), because my personal history basically is such that if I make sounds that are "wrong" in American English I am bad/retarded/handicapped/ugly/should be shunned. Wanting to do right by Welsh place names is actually likely to cause me a fair bit of internal anxiety if I can learn to do it (I've had really hard struggles with the lri sound in the little bit of Japanese I know, as an example).

[smirnoffmule.livejournal.com]

I'm sorry, I hope I didn't contribute to that. This is really like a people-who-live-right-next-to-Wales-have-no-excuse thing, not internationally applicable. I really don't think you'll find it a big deal, especially in Cardiff where lots of the place names are English anyway, and people are used to visitors. And, like I was trying to say somewhere in the TL;DR, it's really not the awful tongue twister it's made out to be.

[rm.livejournal.com]

Oh nah, I'm just having random trauma at you. Really trama was breaking down in diction classes in Australia. I _hated_ that.

[smirnoffmule.livejournal.com]

Uch, I sympathise. This is an area I struggle in too - I can't speak French out loud, because something about those vowels hits me right in all the time I've spent in South London (which, when I speak English, I can choose not to use that accent, but apparently not in French). It is not pretty at all. And very frustrating when the ear can hear it but the mouth can't do anything about it at all.

[cruentum.livejournal.com]

Oh I totally agree, as you know I would, I hope. Because I find Welsh utterly fascinating and I kept telling my parents, while showing off pictures, that it's not, in broad strokes, a difficult language. The details, the mutations et al, the grammatical subtlties, whole other ballgame, but the basic understanding of the words written down, sentence tsructure etc, it's not that big a deal. I havent mastered Ll but I havent talked Welsh to natives either or tried to be coached in it, and I do believe it is, like all langauges, something best learned there if you are curiuos, and as usual, if you do live there you should make an effort to learn the co-official language of your country, just like the Swiss do with their quadruple official languages because that's what you do -- you live in the bloody place, you integrate.

[rm.livejournal.com]

Do not get me started on Switzerland.

[cruentum.livejournal.com]

I have family living there but I know it's a difficult topic at the moment.

[rm.livejournal.com]

I actually really want to see more of it. Because I liked Rapperswil and I'm curious about the French part. Zurich and I, just not so much. But maybe since I'll know what to expect next time it'll be better?

[cruentum.livejournal.com]

I've only ever done it as a tourist for days at a time and I don't have your background and never made your experiences, but then -- as I said, different background so I couldn't possibly say anything. I spent my days drinking coffee in Starbucks and hanging out walking through the streets and along the lake and whatnot. I'm not very talky or communicative when on vacations.

[smirnoffmule.livejournal.com]

British people are absolutely fucking rubbish at languages, seriously, and it's 90% xenophobic refusal to even engage rather than actual ineptitude. Brings out our absolute worst side as a nation.

[meirion.livejournal.com]

Well, if the "encouragement" for actually trying to speak the language is to be instantly clocked as British and told that 90% of the menu is unavailable, when a French family walking in 5 minutes later and insisting on speaking French gets the full menu, it's ... unsurprising if one doesn't bother to try in future. (Mind, my response to that was just to speak French to everyone instead, since the French seemed able to get away with it).