Le Bapteme de Valentine

The reason for our weekend visit to France was to attend the christening of our niece at my brother-in-law's home town of Gisors in Normandy.

It was a big family occasion, not just for the French contingent but also for the Welsh side of our family, with my mother, step-father, aunt, cousins and my cousin's girlfriend all congregating in this lovely French town.

We stayed in a beautiful chambre d'hote (bed & breakfast) called La Neaufliere, located just outside the town. It was our second visit this year and we were happy that we had found the most perfect accommodation with fabulous hosts. However we were sad to hear that the owners are putting the house up for sale to relocate closer to their own children.


It was lovely to see our extended French family again, who we've got to know really well since my sister's wedding in 2001. We all met at the church and greeted each other with the usual set of four kisses each. In Normandy it can take a while to say hello to people you haven't seen for a while and you also have to make plenty of time for goodbyes. One of the French uncles had mistaken me for my sister, so I hope that was an unspoken compliment to my French language skills. We were also pleasantly surprised to see the owner of the chambre' d'hote, Mme Marti, assisting at the christening ceremony.I had wondered how she'd known that there were four children being christened that day. Actually, maybe I need to practice my French a little more.

The ceremony included washing the babies' heads with water at the font and the godparents and family confirmed their commitments to looking after baby Valentine. 21st C Dad was chosen to be the godfather and he played to the occasion beautifully, alongside Melodie, my sister's French would-be sister-in-law, a mademoiselle who works in the music copyright scene in Paris.


After several readings and hymns (and photos of the proud parents), we ventured off into the countryside to visit a beautiful mill for the celebratory lunch. I love old French buildings and this location certainly held up to the idyllic image that I always carry in my mind.


The afternoon was spent enjoying delicious food accompanied by a steady serving of wine, culminating in the presentation of the celebration cake


The christening happened to coincide with a rugby match between Wales and France, so the celebrations couldn't have ended without a rendition of "Mae Hen Wlad Fy Nhadau" and "La Marseillaise" from the respective parties. I am sorry to say that the Marseillaise was the stronger performance, which also represented the finishing score of 34-7 to France. However, not being a rugby supporter or very patriotic, neither offered a great disappointment to me.

After a fabulous afternoon, the day ended with another celebration, that of the 40th wedding anniversary of Monsieur et Madame Leroy, my brother-in-law's parents. So off we went to celebrate with champagne, more food and a touch of traditional dancing in the local "Salle des Fetes"...ah, that's a much more pleasant name for a community centre. The French are very good at that...

...and they were better at "le dancing"!

Fast food and death in Wales

I woke up very early this morning, not sure why but my first thoughts were of my relatives in Wales who are no longer with us. As I couldn't get back to sleep, I thought I'd get up and, in their honour, blog about funeral traditions in Wales where my family would always hire "Dai the Box" to do the undertaking. We would live in the dark for about 4-5 days, with the curtains closed as a sign of respect and on the day of the funeral, the body of the deceased would be brought back to the "Front Room" for those who wished to pay their last respects.....BUT...

...when surfing for some material to back up my social commentary I stumbled upon:

"Death Threats of Bald Elvis"

Okay, not really an Elvis Fan but am intrigued, so let's have a look at the Bald Elvis, aka Elvis Preseli:



At this point I find "The Burger King" just a little intriguing as well as the baldness...


Am now lost for words...


...apparently the band is called Elvis Preseli and the Undertakers. If you're in need of more (whatever that more is) you can find them here....www.theburgerking.co.uk/menu.htm

Minty memories from Wales

Despite the very hot weather today I decided to cook the lamb roast that I bought during yesterday's visit to Wyken. I don't know why, but I suddenly felt compelled to make some mint sauce (this is not a habit which is why I am still a bit shocked).

I found our patch of fresh mint in the garden, which is still pretty small for a renowned invasive plant that has been growing there for three years, and took some leaves back into the kitchen for chopping.

Immediately I was taken back to my memories as a little girl chopping mint in my nan's kitchen in Wales. I can't remember how old I was, but I remember often helping her in the kitchen, shelling peas and slicing carrots that had just been picked from the garden, chopping sage for stuffing, or mixing the dough for Welsh cakes. However, my favourite job was always chopping the mint and helping her make the mint sauce. I still remember the worn out wooden chopping board and old fashioned knife to this very day.

So the recipe (all from memory, so it's fairly vague)...consisted of:

1 tablespoon of freshly chopped mint leaves
3 tablespoons of freshly boiled water
2 or 3 teaspoons of caster sugar
1 or 2 tablespoons of white vinegar to taste

and hey presto lovely mint sauce. Even my husband fell off his chair, not just by the fact that I'd made it, but also by the fact that it was "edible"!

Sut ydych i heddiw? (How are you today?)

Today's comments on Ruby's blog prompted some memories of my schooldays in a mining community in South Wales. Suddenly lots of stuff came flooding back. There's far too much to divulge in one small post, but I thought I would share a few things. As the comments were oriented around language, let's begin there.

Ruby asked if I could speak Welsh. Sadly not. When I grew up in South Wales in the 1970s, Welsh was treated as a foreign language. That's a bit bizarre I know, but in that part of South Wales only a small minority of people were fluent in Welsh. There was one local Welsh school where everything was taught in the mother tongue, but I went to an English speaking school where Welsh was introduced in the 1st year of high school (equivalent of today's Year 7). It was compulsory until O'level, but I chose to enhance my German and French skills instead. In today's cultural backlash, there is a lot more emphasis on learning Welsh and maintaining what was once a dying language.
I regret not spending more time learning my mother tongue, but my lacking in Welsh linguistic skills doesn't prevent me from the odd party trick!

Ironically, I chose French and German o' levels to expand my career options. However I have never needed to use my linguistic skills in my work, except on one occasion whilst working for a technology consultancy in London. Whilst preparing market research material for the Welsh publishing market, it soon became clear that most of the Welsh publishers couldn't quite make sense of the questions. Sadly yours truly was not of much help and was as speechless as my fellow English colleagues and consequently we had to invest in proper translation services. On reporting back to our MD, all he could say was "...and I thought you were bloody Welsh?"

A list of my favourite linguistic Welshisms

Oi boyo
Down by here (pronounced year)
see e.g. Well, we were going into Cardiff see
Dirty Mochyn (Wenglish means dirty pig)
do do e.g I do do this

and my favourite of all... I love the way people's nicknames are based on their profession or key characteristic, for example:

Dai Bandit (whose job it was to fix the gambling machines in pubs)
Dai the Box (our local undertaker)

Anyway, if you are planning to go to Wales and need some help pronouncing the place names, try this BBC Website. You can even learn to say Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch