West Somerset Railway General Discussion

I was in Porthmadog last year and the signs in Tesco telling you what was in each aisle were in Welsh & English, but the English text was half the size of the Welsh text and hard to read!

 

Our local Tesco has the same signage, although I've not heard any staff speaking Welsh, probably because of its close proximity to the English border. Anyway, it's a good way of learning some Welsh.

Nos dda,
Bob.

 

As we're wildly OT, here's a story my father told me. He used to attend NATO Medical Conferences when he was in BAOR. At the start the Norwegian and Danish talked to each other in their own language, but they aren't alike enough for anything more than passing the time of day so after a while they always gave up and spoke English.
Pat

 

Meanwhile, back to the WSR...I see from Mr E's site that the Auto 169 will be staying at Williton after all Hopefully it will be under cover more often now....

 

Looks like they've had to buy themselves an extension - several mentions of financially supporting the WSR.

Keith

 

Nice autotrailer you've got there, shame if it got damaged by the weather...

 

The best bit of code switching I have ever seen is at a Hungarian bar in Cluj. The waitress comes up to me and asks me for my order in Hungarian, I reply in my Romanian, she switches to English to me, takes the order from the next person in Romanian. She then moves to the next table where there were some German tourists and switches to German. She was not an outlier, the whole staff were like this. I was also once berated by an elderly peasant (while watching the cows come home) about my language skills. 'I'm a 77 year old peasant and I can speak Hungarian and Romanian, why can't you?'.

I was taught by a Hungarian who had fled after the revolution in 1956. He spoke perfect English but he never lost his Budapest accent.

Paid the protection money and avoided the metaphorical knee capping. till next time.

 

But we're English, and we all know that the thing to do in foreign countries is to SPEAK LOUDER!

 

There was a point?

 

I am sure this comment is in jest, but for the greater good, can I say " Don't do this"
I was in Kiev some years ago, and was for a few days, separated from the rest of the Brits. There was one Ukranian who spoke English, and without him I was stuffed. Ukranians would shout at me, I would say "Ne panemayoo" (I don't understand) so they would shout louder, and get crosser and louder when I still couldn't understand. Then other Ukranians would help by shouting very loudly and slowly. They might have been offering me a sandwich, but it just comes across as " I vill krush you!"
"I'd have loved to say "Oh sod it, you win. I'll talk Russian"

 

Yes, it was in jest, hence the squad of smilies, I wouldn't actually do it. It would I think be quite rude to do so.

 

https://www.somersetcountygazette.co.uk/
Interesting article in Somerset County Gazette. Still running occasional diesel hauled works trains from time to time. Thought all track work would have ceased.

 

Literal translations from one language to another can be confusing. So I am sometimes asked 'Give me to know your decision' for 'Can you tell me your decision'. It takes a long time before you can 'think' in another language and not in your primary language and then translate. Even with near native speakers this happens, a friend of mine is Polish but lives in the states, her daughter speaks Polish with her mother and family but for example when they were in Warsaw last, her daughter asked for something in Polish but using the US formulation 'Can I have...' so it sounded very odd in Polish. Likewise, my neighbours are Dutch but they have lived and worked abroad for a number of years and the mother was leaving the gym with her youngest and the child said ''Wacht voor mij' rather than 'Wacht op mij'.

I am sure there are very few of us who when we speak another language think in that language and I am quite sure our attempts sound fairly odd to native speakers.

Anyway, one thing I do dislike on forums are people who will post to correct someone's english, for the most part it is possible to understand what someone is trying to say, and even if it isn't, is it so hard to ask someone to explain again? Likewise, if someone is dyslexic then there is a good chance they may misread a post and in turn take the wrong meaning from it. When someone points out that someone spelt a word wrong rather than concentrating on the content it smacks of bullying and playing the person not the message.

 

On my notes I can see the level crossing at Porthmadog has English and Wales words on the signs but I haven’t got anything to say they were different sizes. I wondered how this would have looked if the railway carried on going up the street I think it used to not turn off just after the bridge but keep going. Along the road.

 

It turned off in two directions - to the left, to the wharves on the western side of the harbour, and to the right, but the far side of the petrol station compared to where it turns off now. There was a third side to the triangle, too, and at one time it was mixed gauge (2ft/3ft).

 

It could be argued whether or not that was reasonable, but I can't see how it counts as "ignorant". What is "ignorant" about being bilingual?

 

When I lived in Dorset for a time, it frustrated me when everyone said "where's that to". Usually I replied "erm.. its stationary, its not going anywhere!" It took me ages to get the local meaning.

Don't get me started on dinner at lunch time!

 

Once upon a time two Welsh lads were at the Chelsea Flower Show. One used some blue Welsh language, the other told him off, and the first replied, in Welsh, "It's OK, no bugger here can understand us". Then they heard, also in Welsh "Don't you be so sure". The speaker was a very large Welsh lady. I heard the story from my parents, who were friends of hers.

A b----y good question!

 

I've always found that for road signs the lettering is the same size for both languages, it was only in Tesco that I saw the English in smaller type than the Welsh.

 

I used to work in a building that had a lot of Americans working in it, and I often received e-mails from them along the lines of "My manager has asked me to reach out to you to find if there is is anything you can share about the job you are doing for him".