Welsh wedding invitation.

[Spikeyplant]

Just as it says in the title really.

My DH has a significantly younger relative who is getting married this summer. We have just received an invitation to the wedding, written entirely in Welsh. Neither DH or I speak Welsh and the bride and groom are well aware of this.

I am totally cool with somebody who grew up in a Welsh first language family wanting to celebrate their wedding in their language. However I can't help feeling it is a bit rude to send out invitations in a language many guests can't understand without even a short note in a mutually spoken language.

AIBU?

I'm quite impressed at the poster who described a Welsh-speaking Welsh person having a wedding in Wales as "attention-seeking" for writing the invitation in Welsh. That's pretty special, even for an AIBU thread.

Re ur first post, I dont think u r totally cool about them doing things thru Welsh at all op. If u were, there'd have been no issue.

Greatfuckability - it was me who wrote about my experiences of having a Welsh boyfriend and how they all spoke Welsh at the dinner table. If I tell you that I met him at an English University where he managed to do all of his studies in English and that he was born in Liverpool where he lived for the first 5 years of his life whilst his parents taught in English schools, would that change your perspective?

That experience taught me that there are Welsh people who speak Welsh solely and as a first language, which I think is great (I think it is very important at that all regions of the UK keep their own traditions) but that it can feel quite exclusive and unwelcoming.

It was absolutely deliberate.

Well for me, the two questions are:

Did other members of DH's family also receive invitations in Welsh?

Are you and they planning on going or not?

Secondary third question:
In what language are you all planning to RSVP?????

it does appear that the YABU posts on here are from Welsh people who are annoyed, possibly correctly, at the assumption that English trumps Welsh and it also sets my teeth on edge when I hear English speaking people getting annoyed at 'foreign countries' not speaking English. And in relation to a language whose speakers are dwindling, I get where the defensiveness stems from

Well, I can only speak for myself as a Welsh Speaker, but for me, I'm not annoyed at the OP, more confused and bewildered as to why they would assume its a deliberate slight, as opposed to a mix up/thoughtless thing. My wedding invites went out bilingually, as I'm a welsh speaker who married an an Englishman, so that was the best way, however, it cost extra and was a faff, so if i'd been marrying a fellow welsh speaker, i'd probably have gone with just Welsh. It wouldn't have occured to me that my English speaking friends wouldn't have been able to work it out really as Gwen said, it's fairly obvious. At most they may need to google days of the week/months. and thats about it.
Welsh is not dwindling though, quite the contrary, its thriving even here in the English speaking south, we are opening new Welsh medium schools all the time. I am proud and defensive of my language and the casual rudeness about it. that much I will concede and it's not really hard to see why, when someone's immediate thought on recieving a welsh invite is that 'they' are excluding us and don't want us there!

@archeryannie. See also, "Making A Point"

Greatfuckability - it was me who wrote about my experiences of having a Welsh boyfriend and how they all spoke Welsh at the dinner table. If I tell you that I met him at an English University where he managed to do all of his studies in English and that he was born in Liverpool where he lived for the first 5 years of his life whilst his parents taught in English schools, would that change your perspective?

not really no. I do my studies in English. My children are half english, with an english father. We still slip into Welsh often. They may have spoken only/predominantly in welsh at home even whilst living in England as I did with my children in order for them to learn the language. It feels natural to speak in welsh, and ver 'unnatural' in english. it's to do with neural pathways in the brain.

So Greatfuckability, you would invite a guest who can only understand one of the languages you speak to your house and speak exclusively in the language that you know that can't? And you think that would be OK? Really?

That just seems incredibly rude and ignorant to me!

It's got nothing to do with neural pathways in the brain and everything to do with being an idiot. The majority of the people I work with are bilingual but have the common decency to speak English when I'm present. It's just manners.

Sorry. I shouldn't have called you an idiot. I'm just utterly beliwered that you think this how people should be treated.

I was 21 at the time and have rarely felt so hurt and excluded since. But apparently it is OK according to you.

Maybe there were meant to be two cards in the envelope, or some kind of insert. And it just got stuffed in the next invitation instead.

I was in Spain last week. All the locals kept speaking Spanish. Rude bastards.

Hola.

Unless you know they were deliberately trying to piss you off then it wasn't rude.

Yanbu. Its rude and ignorant of them. I wouldn't go.

So Greatfuckability, you would invite a guest who can only understand one of the languages you speak to your house and speak exclusively in the language that you know that can't? And you think that would be OK? Really

Not on purpose, no, but I can't say it's never happened. It happens with my children's own father. He speaks no welsh, but we do sometimes speak in welsh around him and he will go 'er....hello, still in the room!' because we don't even realise it's happened. we flip back and forth mid sentence sometimes.

Allwch chi os gwelwch yn dda i gyd ffwcio y fuck off gyda'ch siarad Saesneg anghwrtais gwaedlyd. Doeddwn i ddim yn defnyddio gwasanaeth cyfieithu ar-lein rhad ac am ddim i wneud hyn o gwbl. O, na. Byddai hynny'n ffordd rhy anodd.

I think the issue isnt that they will be having a welsh language wedding, if indeed they do, but that if you invite someone to your wedding you do need to give them at least a fighting chance of attending!

If I received an invitation in Mandarin, as mentioned above, I wouldnt be able to translate it because the characters are different. I wouldnt have a clue where or when the wedding is (assuming that the invitation would give away that its is a wedding invite) or where to start with finding out. I would assume this of someone I was inviting if their first and main language is no English. I sent a (as it turned out, very bad) translation of my wedding invitation to my Peruvian friend, which she appreciated even if she couldnt make head nor tail of it :o

If I was having an event where there would be 2 main languages spoken by guests I would either send out a main invitation with a translation or send the welsh speakers one invite in welsh and the english speakers one in english.

By sending something in a language that you know they have no knowledge of it does smack of making it harder for you to attend, so do they really want you there....?

Can you please fuck the fuck off all speak English with your bloody rude. I did not use online translation service free to do so at all. Oh, no. That would be way too difficult.

The perfect example of why online transaltions are shit, as they translate word for word. This is why my invitation translation into spanish caused such mirth in my friend.

nad ydych yn fod yn afresymol

Ond nid oeddent yn anfon gwahoddiad yn Mandarin. Maent yn ei anfon yn Gymraeg. Yr wyf yn meddwl fy mod yn dangos yn gyflym iawn ac yn hawdd i'w gyfieithu ar-lein.

Efallai y cwpl yn credu bod unrhyw un yn deilwng o fynychu eu priodas gael y cwrteisi i trafferthu i gymryd dau funud i gyfieithu'r gwahoddiad.

Neu efallai y gwahoddiad Gymraeg yn ffordd glyfar o chwynnu allan yr holl berthnasau yn Lloegr anwybodus ac yn anghwrtais.

Na, nid wyf yn credu hynny chwaith shadowfax

Mr a Mrs Jones yn gofyn y pleser o'ch cwmni ym mhriodas eu merch.

Yn Eglwys Dewi Sant, Morgannwg Ganol
Ar 15 Mai 2017 am 11am

Gyda derbyniad yn y clwb cymdeithasol lleol.

RSVP

Really, it's not exactly difficult to get the general idea, is it?

I think they thought it would be cute and something a bit different, not offensive.

Although if they have included a poem asking for cash, you are allowed to be offended regardless of the language