Month: June 2013

Sing for Water North

By Simon

Tomorrow the Bangor Community Choir is going to Manchester where we’ll be singing with lots of other choirs from northern England and north Wales to raise money for WaterAid. The songs we’re singing have a watery theme and are all in English, apart from one in Croatian and one in Zulu. Hopefully it will be a bright, sunny day. This event is called Sing for Water North and is part of the Manchester Day celebrations.

We’ll be singing outside the town hall in Albert Square at about 1.45pm. So if you happen to be in Manchester tomorrow afternoon, please come along.

Les mots de la semaine

By Simon
français English Cymraeg Brezhoneg
le linge laundry (clothes) dillad golchi; y golch lien
la blanchisserie laundry (shop, place) golchdy gwennerezh; kannerezh
la laverie (automatique) laundrette laundrette gwalc’herezh; kanndi
la guérison curing, healing, recovery iachau; iachâd pare; gwelladeg
la gueule de bois hangover pen mawr/clwc; salwch bore drannoeth; salwch ar ôl y ffair poan vlev
joindre les deux bouts to make ends meet cael deu ben llinyn ynghyd
avoir beaucoup de mal à joindre les deux bouts; tirer le diable par la queue to stuggle to make ends meet cael yn anodd i gael dau ben llinyn ynghyd
l’influence (f) de l’entourage; pression exercée par les autres peer pressure pwysau cyfoedion
le loup de mer old seadog; sea bass hen forwr; ysbinbysg y môr bleiz mor; ki mor
farcir to stuff (food) llenwi; stwffio farsañ
le fenouil fennel ffenigl; ffunell fanouilh
malveillant evil (person) drwg; drygionus; dihiryn maliset
branlant wobbly (chair/table) sigledig; siglog; woblog brall; divrall
tremblant wobbly (voice/jelly) crynedig krenedik
avoir les jambes flageolantes to feel wobbly teimlo yn sigledig / siglog / woblog sentet trabidellus
Je ne te reproche pas I don’t blame you ni welaf i ddim bai arnat ti
une motte de gazon sod; piece of turf darn o dywarchen moudenn leton
brouter to graze (on grass) pori peuriñ
mouchard grass (informer) prepiwr; hen brep; clep; clepgi to(u)pin
donner qn to grass on sb prepian am/ar rywun kelaouiñ da unan bennak
la flottabilité buoyancy hynofedd flotuster

La gueule de bois

By Simon

This week I discovered that in French a hangover is une gueule de bois (“a wooden mouth”), which seems quite a good description of the condition.

In my thesaurus word for hangover in English include after-effects, katzenjammer, morning after, and the morning after the night before. Do you have any others?

I’ve heard of katzenjammer before, but not in this context – to me it’s the name of a band from Norway. Katzenjammer comes from German and means “cats’ wailing”, and according to the Free Dictionary, it means a confused uproar or a hangover, mainly in US English.

Welsh words for hangover include pen mawr (big head); pen clwc (addled head), salwch bore drannoeth (illness of the following morning) and salwch ar ôl y ffair (illness after the fair).

Since I gave up drinking about 11 years ago I haven’t suffered from a wooden mouth, an addled head or a cats’ wailing, and one reason why I gave up was because I didn’t enjoy such afflictions.