Blogs
IMPORTANT ANNOUNCEMENT FOR WELSH WRITERS
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Wales is justly proud of its literary heritage from the savage poetry of the Gododdin to the genius of Dylans craft or sullen art. The very roots of our culture have been nourished and sustained down the centuries through the transcendent potency of the written word.
Poor we may have been in terms of material wealth but our communities were invariably warm and welcoming. Welsh communal life was frequently hard but always vibrant abounding with choral and dramatic societies rich in native talent that helped enrich the lives of many.
In todays technological world where some communities have fallen into almost terminal decline the written word retains its ancient power and potency to inspire and motivate. It is still the primary means by which individuals and nations give expression to their identity and voice to their dreams.
That is why we are proud and excited to announce the launch of a Welsh based magazine designed specifically to provide a platform for established, new and aspiring Welsh writers. ETO will be launched on March 1st.
ETO will become a voice for writers with Welsh roots and a place where emerging Welsh talent is given the opportunity to reveal itself to the world alongside respected authors with established reputations.
ETO aims to become an aspirational community of writers whose mission is to inspire future generations of authors with a voice distinct to their time who will leave their own unique legacy of time and place. Our focus therefore is mainly on short stories but we will also consider poetry and hope to include the work of one photographer per issue.
ETO seeks to embrace writers who are Welsh, based in Wales, have Welsh roots or simply harbour a love of Wales and all things Welsh. Those of you who would like to be considered for publication please forward your submissions to the following email addresses as attachments.
americymru@gmail.com
As writers ourselves we are tremendously excited at the prospect of working, through ETO, with new and established authors who have a love and a particular perspective of Wales. Allow me to leave you with mine.
Gaabriel Becket , Ceri Shaw and Phil Rowlands
Fathers Song
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They closed my old pit yesterday,
I heard my father say.
No future in it any more, too high a price to pay.
Theyve found gas in the North Sea were not needed anymore,
A way of life is changing boy weve all been shown the door.
He stood there on the picket line his features drawn and thin
And when the blacklegs turned up he refused to let them in.
Your day is dead and over the politicians cry
And sent police to beat him down but still he would not die.
It was dust that took him in the end, the working miners curse.
It clogged his lungs and stole his breath and laid him in the earth.
And as we sang the hymns he loved and gathered round to pray
I knew there was still one thing they could never take away.
I felt it all around me, I saw it in mens eyes,
I heard it in their voices, in every heartfelt sigh.
The spirit of a people, fierce proud and strong
And from somewhere deep within I knew theirs would be my song.
Phil Rowlands
Blwydden Newydd Dda i chi gyd.
I've put together two websites- one temporary, the other being constructed.
I would be grateful for any constructive criticism on them,I'm a novice to this
www.bardinbed.com
www.bardinbed.co.uk
Thanks;
Blwydden Newydd Dda (eto)
Peter
Happy New Year from Dockrad Records! Blwyddyn Newydd Dda pawb!
News of Howl Griff's New Year's Eve Single...
Hope you enjoyed our Howl Griff and Volent releases last year - which you can hear on our Soundcloud site - https://soundcloud.com/dockrad-records . Singer-songwriter Volent has a new EP with electronic influences out in March called 'Broken Promises' check out www.facebook.com/VolenteOfficialPage for updates...and in the meantime here's the great story below of Dockrad's Howl Griff being the first band to be played anywhere in the world in 2013! More info and video at www.howlgriff.com and from Wales online here: http://tinyurl.com/a4vc4cq . You can follow us on Twitter @DockradRecords or on Facebook.com/DockradRecords or visit www.dockrad.com
Diolch am ein cefnogi drwy'r flwyddyn! Dyma stori gwych isod am Howl Griff a sut mai nhw fydd y band cyntaf i gael eu chwarae unrhywle yn y byd yn 2013! Mwy o wybodaeth a gwyliwch y fideo yma - www.howlgriff.com , neu yma arlein gan y Western Mail http://tinyurl.com/a4vc4cq . Mae yna EP newydd electroneg gan Volent allan cyn bo hir ym mis Mawrth o'r enw 'Broken Promises' gwyliwch www.facebook.com/VolenteOfficialPage am newyddion a gwyliwch y gofod am cynnyrch Cymraeg yn ofuan. Gallwch ein dilyn ar Twitter @DockradRecords neu Facebook.com/DockradRecords neu gwelwch www.dockrad.com
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Unique New Years single International Dateline celebrates a year since Samoa crossed timezones and lost December 30th
Welsh band Howl Griff are set to become the first band played on the radio in the year 2013, as Samoan radio prepares to play their unique single, International Dateline, at the stroke of midnight on New Years Day 2013.
Thanks to the fact that Samoa sees in the New Year before any other country, it will make the Welsh-Anglo-American four-piece the first music broadcast in 2013.
The single is all about Samoa, with its lyrics celebrating the countrys decision to hop one day forward last year, aligning their calendar with Australia and New Zealand rather than America. They skipped 30 December 2012, moving straight from 29 December to New Years Eve.
The catchy song, a live favourite for the critically-acclaimed band, is being release to coincide with the first anniversary of this event. It is the second single from the album Fragile Diamond, which has received airplay across many UK radio stations and a torrent of positive reviews.
We were fascinated by the idea of Samoa jumping westwards and skipping a day, missing out December 30, says the groups singer, Hywel Griffiths. So we wrote a song about it.
We were interested in the implications of the move the way Samoa seemed to be stepping away from American influence and towards one more in line with New Zealand, and it led to us writing the lyrics Im changing my mind and crossing the line/ making the time up to you, and I feel one day younger.
When we play gigs in Cardiff or London, we always explain that the song is about Samoa, and it gets people really interested in the fact that they lost a day. One person at a gig said they were glad they hadnt done it here, because December 30 was her birthday.
It is a very danceable, fun song, and it always gets the crowds going, in London or Cardiff. Maybe one day well get to play it in Samoa, or New Zealand. That would be amazing.
You get a lot of Christmas singles, but this is probably the first ever New Years single. Wed love it could get played in Samoa as they watch the New Year dawn. We feel close to the Samoan people too, because theyre always beating us at rugby.
There are over 100 Celtic loan words in English beginning with "car" and everything associated with it. According to one linguist, "penguin" hooded head, is a Welsh word given by the Welsh crew men on the first European ship to see a penguin. The reason the Celtic loan words did not show up until Edward III is because they only literate people were the court and the church. The church used Latin. The court used Saxon, then Norman French and after Edward got into a fight with the French king, it became English and that's when all the Celtic words suddenly appeared. Diolch Judith Jones
Welsh Word of the Da 
y - Gair Cymraeg y Dydd
Welcome to the "Welsh Word of the Day" blog. I have been learning Welsh for several years now, and feel that I have made great strides forward in regards to sentence structure, tense(s), mutations, etc. While I do not claim to be an expert in the Welsh Language, I would like to help other learners who feel a need to expand their vocabulary base. "Welsh Word of the Day" is not a course in the Welsh language, but a supplement to those who have some knowledge of the language, or to those who just have an interest in learning a few Welsh words.
My goal is to provide a new Welsh word Monday-Friday (as my work schedule permits). I will give the word, definition, and how to pronounce it. My hope is that readers will reply and use the word in a Welsh sentence. This would be beneficial to us all. If you have suggestions feel free to send me a message via AmeriCymru.
In addition to this blog, a complete list of the Welsh Word(s) Of The Day can be found at http://americymru.net/page/welsh-word-of-the-day and http://americymru.net/page/welsh-word-of-the-day-2014
Our inaugural word of the day is Eisteddfod . Eisteddfod is one of the few Welsh words that have entered the English language. Eisteddfod is also the Welsh word that is most familiar to those in the United States.
Eisteddfod [eye-STETH-vod.] - Sitting, a session (Welsh), Welsh competitive festival of the arts especially in poetry and singing (USA English Translation).
**Remember that the dd is like the "th" used in the word "the."
Dwi' n mynd i'r Eisteddfod (I am going to the Eisteddfod ).
Hi,I volunteer for the Carmartheshire Life magazine and we are always looking for interesting articles and photographs, if you have anything you would like to contribute please let me know. Carmarthenshire Life is a not for profit magazine and is run by volunteers with an interest in Carmarthenshire.
Happy New Year/Blwyddyn Newydd Dda 2013 to all our members and readers
Check out our new Calendar feature on AC
WELSH HISTORY CALENDAR - JANUARY/IONAWR
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WE WAS BRUNG UP PROPER !!
"And we never had a whole Mars bar until 1993"!!!
CONGRATULATIONS TO ALL MY FRIENDS WHO WERE BORN IN THE
1930-39 & 1940's to 1950's
First, we survived being born to mothers who smoked and/or drank sherry while they carried us and lived in houses made of asbestos...
They took aspirin, ate blue cheese, bread and dripping, raw egg products, loads of bacon and processed meat, tuna from a can, and didn't get tested for diabetes or cervical cancer.
Then after that trauma, our baby cots were covered with bright coloured lead-based paints.
We had no childproof lids on medicine bottles, doors or cabinets and when we rode our bikes, we had no helmets or shoes, not to mention, the risks we took hitchhiking.
As children, we would ride in cars with no seat belts or air bags.
We drank water from the garden hose and NOT from a bottle.
Take away food was limited to fish and chips, no pizza shops, McDonalds , KFC, Subway or Nandos.
Even though all the shops closed at 6.00pm and didn't open on a Sunday, somehow we didn't starve to death!
We shared one soft drink with four friends, from one bottle and NO ONE actually died from this.
We could collect old drink bottles and cash them in at the corner store and buy Toffees, Gobstoppers and Bubble Gum.
We ate cupcakes, white bread and real butter,milk from the cow,and drank soft drinks with sugar in it, but we weren't overweight because......
WE WERE ALWAYS OUTSIDE PLAYING!!
We would leave home in the morning and play all day, as long as we were back when the streetlights came on.
No one was able to reach us all day. And we were O..K.
We would spend hours building our go-carts out of old prams and then ride down the hill, only to find out we forgot the brakes. We built tree houses and dens and played in river beds with matchbox cars.
We did not have Playstations, Nintendo Wii , X-boxes, no video games at all, no 999 channels on SKY ,
no video/dvd films, or colour TV
no mobile phones, no personal computers, no Internet or Internet chat rooms..........WE HAD FRIENDS and we went outside and found them!
We fell out of trees, got cut, broke bones and teeth and there were no
Lawsuits from these accidents.
Only girls had pierced ears!
We ate worms and mud pies made from dirt, and the worms did not live in us forever.
You could only buy Easter Eggs and Hot Cross Buns at Easter time....
We were given air guns and catapults for our 10th birthdays,
We rode bikes or walked to a friend's house and knocked on the door or rang the bell, or just yelled for them!
Mum didn't have to go to work to help dad make ends meet because we didn't need to keep up with the Jones's!
Not everyone made the rugby/football/cricket/netball team. Those who didn't had to learn to deal with disappointment. Imagine that!! Getting into the team was based on
MERIT
Our teachers used to hit us with canes and gym shoes and throw the blackboard rubber at us if they thought we weren't concentrating ...
We can string sentences together and spell and have proper conversations because of a good, solid three R's education.
Our parents would tell us to ask a stranger to help us cross the road.
The idea of a parent bailing us out if we broke the law was unheard of.
They actually sided with the law!
Our parents didn't invent stupid names for their kids like 'Kiora' and 'Blade' and 'Ridge' and 'Vanilla'
We had freedom, failure, success and responsibility, and we learned HOW TO
DEAL WITH IT ALL !
And YOU are one of them!
CONGRATULATIONS!
You might want to share this with others who have had the luck to grow up as kids, before the lawyers and the government regulated our lives for our own good.
And while you are at it, forward it to your kids so they will know how brave their parents were.
PS -The big type is because your eyes are not too good at your age anymore
Archbishop Rowan Williams becomes Honorary Vice President of Dylan Thomas Society
By Dylan Thomas Birthplace, 2012-12-30
The Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams has agreed to become an Honorary Vice President of the Dylan Thomas Society as it heads towards the centenary of the writers birth in 2014.
The invitation was accepted during an meeting between Archbishop Rowan and the vice chairman of the Society Geoff Haden in which they recorded an interview on Dylan Thomas to feature in an archive at the poets birthplace at 5 Cwmdonkin Drive in Swansea.
The interview, which took place at Lambeth Palace, covered the influence that Dylan Thomas had on Archbishop Rowan who, like Dylan, was born and brought up in Swansea and is a published poet observed I think all of us who were interested in literature at school in Swansea of that generation fancied ourselves as the Dylan Thomas of the next generation and were very much influenced by the superficial style and tried to copy it.
Geoff Haden found that Like Dylan Rowan Williams has a deep affinity with Swansea as it is a place that draws one back.
The interview was part of a project, 100 Voices, to produce one hundred interviews of people who met or were influenced by Dylan over the past one hundred years.
The project is well on its way and meeting people of all walks of life has been fascinating and range from the maid who worked for the Thomas family when Dylan was a teenager to President Jimmy Carter who has been a lifelong fan.
Said Society chairman Jeff Towns We already have Dylans granddaughter Hannah Ellis as our active President and I am delighted that the Archbishop has accepted our invitation as we approach 2014.
The Archbishop saw the centenary as an important milestone and said The best way of celebrating is to encourage young writers and I hope that whatever is done for the centenary thee will be a lasting memorial that will help young people writing poetry and prose perhaps by spending some time with a senior writer or poet.
The edited interview will be showing for house tour visitors at the Dylan Thomas Birthplace at the start of 2013.
Video clip approx 45 seconds starting with quote in last paragraph
https://dl.dropbox.com/u/75221900/Rowan%20Williams%20Dylan%20Memorial.mp4
Audio clip as above in wav and aif
https://dl.dropbox.com/u/75221900/Rowan%20Williams%20Dylan%20Memorial.wav
https://dl.dropbox.com/u/75221900/Rowan%20Williams%20Dylan%20Memorial.aif
The Dylan Thomas Society of GB was founded in 1977 and has been at the forefront of promoting the life and work of Dylan Thomas ever since. The membership is from all over the world including Australia, Japan and USA. It was one of the leading champions of a memorial stone to the poet in Westminster Abbeys Poets Corner and holds a memorial service each year around the time of his birth on 27 th October 1914 at Westminster Abbey. The society holds regular meetings and membership entitles free entry to the Dylan Thomas Birthplace house tours http://www.thedylanthomassocietyofgb.co.uk
