From Times OnlineNovember 4, 2009Owen Slot, Chief Sports ReporterMike Tyson arrived through Heathrow yesterday... He then left for Merthyr Tydfil, not the most obvious of destinations,...Your CommentsByn Walters wrote:Why the flippant remark "...Merthyr Tydfil, not the most obvious of destinations"? Mike Tyson was a boxer, Merthyr was a boxing town; this is a sports page, so what could be more obvious than that? It wasn't only Johnny Owen he had in mind, he also admired Howard Winstone, featherweight world champion when that phrase meant something; there was Jimmy Wilde, who some say was the best pound for pound fighter in the history of the sport; world champion Ken Buchanan was trained there, so was contender Colin Jones; their manager, Eddie Thomas was European Champion, again, when it meant something; flatten out the hills and the story magnifies to include boxers of the calibre of Tommy Farr who took Joe Louis the distance; so don't be so flippant next time you mention Merthyr and boxing in the same articleNovember 3, 2009 10:37 PM GMT on community.timesonline.co.uk

Wales Is Honoured As 7th Greatest Destination In The World By National Geographic SurveySource: Welsh Assembly Government Posted on: 27th October 2009In the November/ December edition of the National Geographics Traveler Magazine, Wales is ranked 7th among 133 destinations surveyed in a sixth annual survey of destination stewardship.The survey is carried out by the National Geographic Societys Centre for Sustainable Destinations.The survey is not positioned as a popularity contest but rather as an assessment of authenticity and stewardship and how development, mass tourism, pollution and globalization has affected some of the worlds iconic destinations.Wales was ranked seventh as one of the best rated places, said to be in excellent shape relatively unspoiled and likely to remain so. Also in seventh position were the Berkshires in Massachusetts, USA; Douro Valley in Portugal and the Engadine Region, Switzerland. The Fjords, Norway came top of the survey.A panellists comments about Wales were: I was gobsmacked by the beauty of the Welsh countryside, while another said that it was: extraordinary verdant with 500,000 Welsh Speakers. The downsides were marked as the rainy weather and environmental degradation from mining.Heritage Minister, Alun Ffred Jones commented:Its fantastic news for Wales that weve been ranked so highly in this survey. The surveys focus is on how a destination has retained its authenticity and has developed sustainably which is crucial in these days of mass tourism. The Assembly Government has emphasised that for tourism to prosper it is essential that we safeguard and enhance our unique assets which visitors come here to enjoy. Our Sustainable Tourism Framework acknowledges that the potential of the environment will always be a key priority in the development of tourism. In addition to this, we believe that tourism development considers the needs and quality of life of local communities, enhance and respect culture and local traditions, contribute to local economic prosperity as well as minimise damage to the environment.We pride ourselves in selling Wales as a destination which is authentic, real and unique. By staying true to Wales core values we can develop tourism in a sustainable manner which wont degrade our natural assets. Our marketing campaigns position Wales as a destination which can offer a truer, richer, deeper, experience where people can get involved in the local history and culture and landscape.Topics: globalization, Great destination, National geographic, pollution, stewardship, tourism, Wales, Wales core values, Welsh countryside

Welsh choir, soloists to perform at Trinity UCCDaily Record/Sunday NewsUpdated: 10/27/2009 02:53:23 PM EDTTrinity United Church of Christ will host a concert by the Rehoboth Welsh Choir from Delta at 7 p.m. Nov. 7.Celtic harpist Meghan Gwyer of Laurel, Md., and soloist Sabrina Coleman-Clark will perform. A freewill offering will be collected.The church is at 22 W. Market St. For details, call 848-1775.The choir will also perform at Longwood Gardens in Kennett Square, Chester County, 7 and 8 p.m. Dec. 1 and at the Rehoboth Welsh Church in Delta 2:30 and 7 p.m. Dec. 4.Privacy Policy | MNG Corporate Site Map | Copyright

[Media Newswire - Press Release Distribution]For IWP participant Fflur Dafydd, the Welsh language is in her bloodWhy would a writer who grew up bilingual, with one language the most-spoken in the world and the other understood by only 700,000, choose to limit her audience by working primarily in the language spoken by the few rather than the many? For fiction writer and singer/songwriter Fflur Dafydd, a participant in the 2009 University of Iowa International Writing program the answer is simple: Welsh is in her blood.(Media-Newswire.com) - Why would a writer who grew up bilingual, with one language the most-spoken in the world and the other understood by only 700,000, choose to limit her audience by working primarily in the language spoken by the few rather than the many? For fiction writer and singer/songwriter Fflur Dafydd, a participant in the 2009 University of Iowa International Writing program the answer is simple: Welsh is in her blood.( Fflur Dafydd is pronounced fleer DAH-fith. )"I grew up with Welsh-language activists for parents," she said. "They were very much involved in the Welsh Language Society [see http://tiny.cc/YRdmI ]. During the '60s and '70s there were many things that needed to be done. We didn't have bilingual road signs; we didn't have a proper Welsh Language Act; we didn't have Welsh television. So there was a real struggle at that time against English imperialism."Both my parents were imprisoned at different times for their acts. My father was imprisoned for six months when I was a baby for his role in a campaign where 12 people from the Welsh Language Society demolished a transmitting tower because there was no Welsh-language television channel. In the end we did triumph, and my parent's generation achieved quite a bit. We were able to have a bilingual education and we were able to reap the rewards of a new attitude toward bilingualism."So when Dafydd writes and sings in Welsh, her motivations are both literary and political. "Any activism I do it through the work," she said. "The songs are not overtly political, but singing in Welsh is a political decision. I feel that I want to record only in Welsh, I feel that I have something to bring to the Welsh music scene because there are so few of us. I don't think the English language world needs my songs in English in the same way."She has released three albums in Welsh and has performed in Ireland, Belgium, Croatia, Finland and the United States. [See http://www.myspace.com/fflurdafydd and http://www.fflurdafydd.com/ for more information on her work.]And yet, because of the encouragement of her publishers and readers, Dafydd's recent writing has become available in English. Her second novel "Atyniad" ( "Attraction" ) was awarded the prose medal at the 2006 National Eisteddfod -- a traditional Welsh competition for writers and musicians -- and is now available in her English "translation" as "20,000 Saints.""It's been a very long journey for this story, and it has gone through several mutations, but the genesis of it was when I spent six weeks on Bardsey Island ( Ynys Enlli in Welsh ) in 2002 as their first-ever writer in residence. It's quite remote. You have to get there by boat; there's not much electricity; there is a very small community living there; it is only two miles across."All sorts of different people are drawn there for different reasons. I found myself being the only artist on the island, but surrounded by people who were interested in a lot of the different aspects of the island -- the archeology, the bird-watching, people who go there for religious reasons. I found this rich tapestry of people and events, and also a real intensity. On one hand you are free and away from the world, but you are also incarcerated, and you can't leave the space. These tensions were a real gift for a writer. The story started with this canvas."I wrote a book that was quite abstract and fragmentary. A collection of different recollections of my experiences on the island, coupled with fictional characters and some real character, and there was real mingling of genres."After winning the prose medal, her Welsh activist spirit convinced her that the book provided an opportunity to educate English-language readers about this iconic location in Wales where, according to myth, 20,000 saints must be buried because of all the religious pilgrims who died there."When I began writing it in English I realized that this kind of fragmentary rhythmic narrative that worked in Welsh perhaps didn't work as well in English because of the difference between the languages," she explains. "English is perhaps cooler and more exact, while Welsh was more passionate. What seemed poetic in Welsh seemed overindulgent in English. The kind of humor I have in Welsh is definitely different because I'm inside the culture -- I poke fun at things that Welsh speakers understand. In English I have a different register for the humor -- more understated. Writing in the two languages is like working with different tools. It's like having these two people inside you and they are influencing each other."That's when I decided to have a little bit of different agenda, and I saw it as a golden opportunity to talk about the Welsh language and what it's like to be a Welsh speaker, and to be in this small country and have the tensions of a small country. So the island in "20,000 Saints" becomes a microcosm of Wales, and how extreme we can get, but also how we interact with each other in creative ways. By the end of it I had a novel double in size with a completely different thread in terms of plot and the emotional development of the characters. It's been a very interesting and rewarding process."The result led to her selection as the Oxfam Emerging Writer of the Year.Her third novel, "Y Llyfgell" ( The Library ), winner of the 2009 David Owen Prize, the top fiction prize in Wales, in going through a similar process, in which the English version will not be so much a translation as a re-imagining in a different language, for different readers.The library in the title is the Welsh National Library, an institution that is another source of national pride.But she is not straying far from her roots: She is simultaneously writing a new collection of short stories in Welsh. "I feel very proud that of all the Celtic languages Welsh is the one that has flourished," she says. "The fact that I am able to live my daily life through the medium of Welsh -- most of the colleagues in my department at Swansea are Welsh-speakers, the people around me are Welsh speakers -- sometimes I forget that it is a minority language. Watching Welsh on television, sometimes you can forget. That for me is a blissful thing that occasionally you forget that not everyone speaks this language."Dafydd, who teaches at the University of Wales at Swansea and also writes poetry and scripts for film and television, is the first writer to attend the IWP through a new partnership with the British Council's UK Writer-in-Residence Program.Biographies of all the 2009 IWP writers are accessible at http://iwp.uiowa.edu/writers/index.html .UI arts events are searchable on the UI Master Calendar: http://calendar.uiowa.edu . For additional arts information, visit http://www.uiowa.edu/artsiowa . To receive UI arts news by e-mail, go to http://list.uiowa.edu/archives/acr-news.html and click the link "Join or Leave ACR News," then follow the instructions.STORY SOURCE: University of Iowa Arts Center Relations, 300 Plaza Centre One, Suite 351, Iowa City, IA 52242-2500MEDIA CONTACT: Winston Barclay, 319-384-0073 ( office ) 319-430-1013 ( cell ), winston-barclay@uiowa.eduBookmark and SharePublished by:Release DateThis story was released on 2009-10-21. Please make sure to visit the official company or organization web site to learn more about the original release date. See our disclaimer for additional information.(c) Media-Newswire.com - All Rights Reserved

I'm reading this minute a French publication entitled 'Midi Olympique Magazine', dated monday 5 October, apparently Hirwaun is in the heart of the Rhondda Valley at the extreme south-west of the Principality, where all the mines were called the Big Pit, the mine owners were English and every mine had its rugby club. Now I'm on dodgy ground, I don't remember 120 miners dying in an explosion at Hirwaun in 1966, and I don't remember 114 dying in a flood in 1975 at Cymmer, it might have happened; Newport, Llanelli, Swansea and Cardiff are the economic lungs of the west coast. They headed towards the Brecon Forest and along the way they stopped at a pub at the side of the road in Trehafod called the 'Royal Oak', which translated from the French means 'Royal Eagle', it is part of an industry that will never know a crisis in Wales, that of hops. Inside the pub they were told a story of a university educated coach who warned the local rugby team of an imminent match against the French who were renowned for their rough play, the miners in the team laughed, they knew all about violence, for hadn't they only recently lost 120 fellow workers in the bowels of the Welsh earth! A customer brought it in to me yesterday and I thought I'd share it with you.Right, let me explain for those non-Welsh amongst you: Hirwaun is not in the Rhondda, is not in the south-west; Big-Pit is not a name for pits in Wales, only one tourist attraction; the biggest mine owner in the Rhondda was David Davies, a Welshman who built Barry docks; not every mine had its rugby club;120 people died in Aerfan, not Hirwaun, in 1966 but not one was a miner; neither Newport, Cardiff, Swansea nor Llanelli is on the west coast; I don't know of a brecon forest; Royal Oak does not translate 'l'Aigle Royal' as for the hops, pubs are closing everywhere; Where did they get this journalist, and did they pay him; didn't they expect anybody to check?

Bit of a surprise!

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/culture-obituaries/tv-radio-obituaries/6308994/Patrick-Hannan.html

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News WalesItaly honours Welsh writersFor the second time in two months a literary institution in Italy has chosen to honour a writer from Wales.Poet Menna Elfyn will be awarded the Anima Istranza Foreign Prize for Poetry at the International Festival of the City of Olbia on the island of Sardinia on Sunday 25 October 2009.The prize is awarded every two years by the Amistade cultural society which established the Olbia festival in 2001 to enable Sardinians to discuss the literatures and cultures of other minority languages as well as their own."Two years ago, the foreign prize for poetry was given to the Irish poet Nuala N Dhomhnaill. This year, we are honoured to present the prize to Menna Elfyn as an acknowledgement of her activities in defending and promoting the Welsh language and for the quality of her poetry," said President of the awarding committee, Giuseppe Serpillo.The committee studied poems by Menna published in two volumes - Autobiografia in Versi and I nuovi bardi - which have been translated into Italian by Andrea Bianchi and Silvana Siviero.Both volumes are part of the Geiriau o Gymru (Words from Wales) /Parole dal Galles series which is published by Mobydick in Italy with support from Wales Literature Exchange.To show her appreciation, Menna Elfyn has written a special poem to Sardinia which she will read at the prize-giving ceremony."I feel it is a privilege to be awarded this prize. It's an international award and it shows the importance of going out into the world, and sharing our literature and culture rather than keeping it within the confines of Wales," said Menna."Literature travels and through translation, Welsh writing can be heard and appreciated in languages other than English which is perhaps the most common language of translation. I hope this award will offer some form of inspiration to other poets who are trying to write in a minority language," added Menna whose own work has been translated into around 18 different languages.In September author Harri Pritchard Jones travelled from Cardiff to receive the City of Sassari International Award for Minority Languages in Sardinia.Both Menna Elfyn and Harri Pritchard Jones will return to Italy in November to speak at a series of literary events in Bologna, Venice and Coderno di Sedegliano in Udine.Back

Perhaps I should explain my earlier blogs; Jan Morris got her fact wrong in stating that Crumlin is in Glamorgan, the viaduct was well into Monmouthshire. I am from Merthyr Tydfil, and to go to work in Ebbw Vale I crossed the River Rhymney at Rhymney Bridge, the County border, and past the River Sirhowy at Tredegar before arriving at the head of the Ebbw Fawr, which, after its confluence with the Ebbw Fach was the river that the viaduct spanned. The Glamorganshire Canal ran from the Cyfarthfa Iron Works at Georgetown, Merthyr Tydfil down the Taff Valley to the docks at Cardiff.As for the Cymric Celts; the first wave of Celts were the 'Q' Celtic or Gaels, followed by the second wave, the 'P' Celtic or Brythons, British or Britons: it was this second wave of Celts who began referring to themselves as the Cymry, the first mention of which was in the 'Armes Prydein Fawr', 'The Great Prophesy of Britain', written between 935 and 950. Although, according to Geoffrey of Monmouth, Wales was named after Kamber, a son of Brutus, leader of the Trojans, who gave his name to the Britons.He had two brothers, Albanactus and Locrinus, who gave their names to Scotland (Yr Alban) and England (Lloegr) respectively.Owen M. Edwards says that for a long time the name Cymry was despised as a term of reproach, to express degeneracy, taking the place of the proud name of Britons and didn't come into its own until the rule of Llywelyn Fawr, when by then it was obvious where we stood. 'Britain' was still used by the bards, but the leaders were now Princes of Cymru.