Mi ddaeth ffrind o’r côr cymuned i’r grŵp sgwrsio ddoe, ac ro’n ni’n siarad am ac yn yr Almaeneg yn bennaf. Dw i ‘di anghofio llawer o fy Almaeneg, ond mae’n dod yn ôl erbyn hyn. Ar ôl hyn mi es i adref am dipyn o fwyd, ac yna mi es i Caffi Blue Sky am noswaith o farddoniaeth a cherddoriaeth – rhan o wŷl barddoniaeth rhyngwladol. Mi wnaeth tri band lleol yn canu, ac mi wnaeth bardd o Wlad Pwyl yn adrodd ei gerddi yn y Bwyleg efo cyfeiliant un o’r bandiau. Roedd y band cyntaf yn uchel dros ben llestri efo gitâr trydan yn sgrechian, ond roedd y bandiau eraill yn well.
A friend from the community choir came to the conversation group yesterday, and we talked mainly about and in German. I’ve forgotten a lot of my German, but it’s starting to come back. After that I went home for a bit to eat, then went to the Blue Sky Café for an evening of music and poetry – part of an international festival of poetry. Three bands played, and a poetry from Poland recited with poetry in Polish with accompaniment from one of the bands. The first band were way too loud with an electric guitar screeching away, but the other bands were better.
Here’s a recording in a mystery language.
Can you identify the language, and do you know where it’s spoken?
Bore ddoe mi es i i’r grŵp recordyddion, ond roedd dim ond dau ohonon ni yna – mi wnaeth un o’r aelodau angofio bod y grŵp yn cyfarfod ddoe – felly mi wnaethon ni penderfynu gohirio’r sesiwn hyd yr wythnos nesaf. Mi wnes i canu yn y côr MS yn y prynhawn, ac mi wnes i aros gatref gyda’r nos.
Yesterday morning I went to the recorder group, but there were only two of us there – one member of the group forget that we were meeting yesterday – so we decided to postpone the session until next week. I sang in the MS choir in the afternoon, and had a night in.
When looking through one of my dictionaries today I came across the word cahoot, which I’ve only seen before in the form cahoots, as in the expression ‘in cahoots with’, i.e. to be in partnership or in league with. The dictionary entry has the s in bracketts – cahoot(s) – so it seems this words can be used in the singular as well. Have you heard it used like that, or do you use it like that?
According to the OED, cahoot can also be used as a verb meaning ‘to act in partnership’. The following example is given, ‘They all agree to cahoot with their claims against Nicaragua and Costa Rica.’, which dates from 1857, so I suspect this might not be a contemporary use of the word, though I may be wrong.
The OED also states that cahoot is ‘Used in the South and West [of the USA] to denote a company, or partnership’, usually in the plural.
Cahoot either comes from the French cahute (cabin; poor hut), or from cohorte, from the Latin cohort (court, enclosure, company of soldiers).
| français | English | Cymraeg | Brezhoneg |
|---|---|---|---|
| la boîte à gants; vide-poche | glove box | bocs/blwch maneg (?) | lak-pep-tra |
| le visage impassible | poker face | wyneb difnegiant | |
| le courroux; la colère | wrath | dig; dicter; digofaint | buanegezh; droug |
| les raisins de la colère | the grapes of wrath | grawnwin digofaint | |
| rayé(e); à rayures | striped | rhesog; streipiog | rezennet |
| le pull-over | jumper | siwmper | stamm |
| le directeur intérim | acting manager | rheolwr gweithredol | rener etreadegourien |
| les ordures | (household) rubbish | (y)sbwriel | stronkoù |
| les déchets | (garden) rubbish | cribinion | lostajoù; stronkajoù |
| la camelote | rubbish (junk) | hen drugareddau; sothach | brizhvarc’hadourezh |
| le orgue | organ (instrument) | organ | orglez |
Roedd dim ond tri ohonon ni yn y grŵp sgwrsio Ffrangeg heno – wel tri a hanner, a dweud y gwir – roedd un arall sy’n medru deall Ffrangeg ac sy’n methu ei siarad. Ar ôl awr o Ffrangeg mi es i i’r clwb iwcwlili yn y tafarn Groegeg. Roedd llai ohonon ni yna na’r wythnos diwetha’ – tua deg, dw i’n meddwl, ond mae hyn yn lot mwy na’r tymor diwetha’. Heblaw’r caneuon arferol, mi wnes i canu rhyw ganeuon fy hunan hefyd, caneuon dw i ‘di sgwenu.
There were only three of us in the French conversation group tonight – well, three and a half actually – there was one who can understand French but doesn’t speak it. After an hour of French I went to the ukulele club in the Greek. There were fewer of us there than last week – about 10, I think, but that’s a lot more than last term. Apart from the usual songs, I also sang a few of my own songs, songs that I’ve written.
The other day I discovered that the Hungarian word szia [sijɑ], which is used as a informal hello and goodbye, like ciao in Italian and ahoj in Czech and Slovak, possibly comes from the English expression ‘see you’ / ‘see ya’, at least that’s what a Hungarian friend believes. I hadn’t noticed the similarity between the two phrases before, and if I had, I would have assumed that it was a coincidence.
Another possible origin for this word is the Austria greeting/parting word servus, which is written szervusz in Hungarian, and which somehow became szia. This is the etymology given by Zaicz Gábor in the Etimológiai szótár (Etymology Dictionary) according to this discussion.
Does anybody know more about the origins of this word?
Ar ôl brecwast y bore ‘ma mi wnes i taflu yr afalau olaf o’r afallen yn fy ngardd, ac yna mi es i i’r archfachnad. Roedd hi’n bwrw glaw mân ar y ffordd yna, ac ar y ffordd adref mi wnaeth hi’n dechrau treisio bwrw. Yn ffodus roedd gen i trywsus dal dŵr, felly do’n i ddim gor wlyb. Mi wnes i tipyn bach o waith cyn ac ar ôl cinio, ac mi wnes canu cerddoriaeth efo ffrindiau yn y prynhawn. Gyda’r nos mi wnes i canu yn y côr cymuned. Dan ni’n dysgu cân o’r ardal Megrelian yn Georgia ar hyn o bryd – mae’r geiriau yn anodd i ynganu ac i gofio, ond mae’r cytgordiau yn hyfryd.
After breakfast this morning I picked the last of the apples from the apple tree in my garden, and then went to the supermarket. It was drizzling on the way there, and on the way back it started to pour down. Fortunately I had my waterproof trouser, so I didn’t get too wet. I did a bit of work before and after lunch, and played music with friends in the afternoon. In the evening I went to the community choir. We are learning a song from the Megrelian region of Georgia at the moment – the words are difficult to pronounce and to remember, but the harmonies are lovely.
Heno mi wnaethon ni siarad am y Wyddeleg a llawer ieithoedd a phethau eraill yn y grŵp sgrwsio amlieithog. Yn Global Café ar ôl hyn mi wnes i cwrdd â myfyrwragedd o Gorea ac roedden nhw’n synnu i glywed fi yn dweud rhyw eiriau yn y Gorëeg – mi wnes i dysgu tipyn bach o Gorëeg efo ffrindiau o Gorea pan ro’n i’n dysgu Tsieinëeg yn Taiwan.
Tonight we talked about Irish and lots of other languages and other things in the polyglot conversation group. In Global Café after that I met some students from Korea who were very surprised that to hear me say a few words in Korean – I learnt a little bit of Korean from Korean friends when I was studying Chinese in Taiwan.