Blodwen Is Welsh

Copyright oggbashan March 2022

The author asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

This is a work of fiction. The events described here are imaginary; the settings and characters are fictitious and are not intended to represent specific places or living persons.

This is an entry to the April Fool contest and a celebration of St David's Day (1st March)

Many conversations would be in Welsh but translated into English.

+++

I was a late Sunday afternoon. I had just parked my car.

"Croeso, Huw Dafydd,"

I had rung the doorbell of the Owens' house in Swansea. They had been our next-door neighbours when I was born. As I walked up the front path, I had been looking at what had been our family home next door. It was much smaller than I remembered and now had double glazed replacement windows.

Of course, it seemed smaller. I had been four years old when my family moved to London for a better job for my father. I had been remembering it as it was when I was four.

Blodwen had been a few months younger than me, and we had been playmates. The Blodwen who was greeting me now was nothing like the four-year-old I remembered. This Blodwen was glorious, a shapely adult woman with glossy black hair and a sultry voice that sent shivers down my spine.

She had called me Huw Dafydd. That was what was written on my birth certificate but for over twenty years I had been Hugh David in England.

She continued to speak, a couple of sentences in Welsh that I couldn't understand. But her actions gave me a clue about their meaning. She pulled me into a hug and kissed me full on the lips.

I was nearly out of breath when the kiss ended.

"That was a wonderful welcome, Blodwen. But I didn't understand what you said. I can't speak or understand Welsh."

"That's a shame, Huw. My English is rusty. You know I am a teacher?"

"Yes, Blodwen. You told me and sent a picture of your school."

We had been pen pals for nearly twenty years since we both learned to write. During the last five years we had been using email and Zoom. I hadn't noticed that Blodwen's English was rusty

"In Wales, to be a teacher, you have to be bilingual. But my school is in Aberystwyth and all teaching is done in Welsh. My parents both work in local government. In Wales you can't be promoted unless you are competent in Welsh."

"So, what did you say to me?"

Blodwen blushed.

I knew you wouldn't understand but..."

"But...?"

"You've grown since I used to call you big brother next door."

Blodwen blushed again.

"And? There were two sentences."

Blodwen whispered:

"I like the new larger Huw; I could love him."

"I love you, Blodwen. I took the job in Swansea to be nearer to you."

"You did?"

I couldn't reply. Blodwen was kissing me again.

+++

I work for a large London Lloyds broking company. When they decided to open an office in Wales, I was the only person who applied to be the branch manager, No one else wanted to leave London. It was a promotion for me. I would have a much-increased salary and effectively be my own boss.

But it was the possibility of seeing Blodwen for real instead of on a screen that tipped the balance. For the past three years we had been sending love messages to each other. Blodwen, on Zoom, had been singing love songs to me in Welsh. I had to search for English translations online and was surprised at how direct Blodwen was being.

I had responded with love songs in English. She is a good mezzo-soprano; I am a competent tenor. Sometimes we had sung duets together, a hundred or so miles apart.

When I had announced that I was coming to Swansea, Blodwen's parents, through her, offered me a bedroom while I searched for a building that could be my office and hopefully my accommodation as well. Sharing a house with Blodwen while she was on vacation from her school sounded ideal. It seemed that Blodwen liked the idea too.

Blodwen said something else to me in Welsh. That was frustrating. I suspected she was teasing me, but she took my hand and pulled me into the kitchen/breakfast room to meet her parents.

They didn't look much different. They had a few more lines on their faces and some grey hairs, but these were the substitute parents I remembered. Mr Owens shook my hand. Mrs Owens hugged me. She seemed so small.

She said: "Blodwen had told us you were tall, Huw, but that tall?"

"Yes, I forgot when to stop growing. But I am very pleased to meet Blodwen Bach again."

Blodwen pretended to hit me.

"Blodwen Bach? Small Blodwen?" her father queried. "She is among the tallest women in Swansea."

"I'm five feet ten inches, Huw," Blodwen said.

"Maybe. But you still seem small next to me."

I hugged her. Blodwen's head was at my shoulders.

"How tall are you, Huw?" Blodwen asked.

"Six feet and eight inches, Blodwen."

"In Swansea you will be the giant, Huw." Blodwen said.

We went through to the living room. It was as I remembered it but much smaller. The television has been replaced by a modern flat screen, otherwise it was the same. The upright piano still had pride of place. Blodwen and I had played on the floor as her parents played the piano and sang. I had to walk around the hanging light. Blodwen pulled me to sit on the settee beside her.

"Huw? My parents are learning Welsh. They are not very advanced yet, but I am teaching them, so most of the time we speak Welsh. If you are going to be working in Swansea, you should too."

"I thought most people in Swansea spoke English, Blodwen."

"Most of them do, but we have visitors from inland Wales whose English is not very good, so you should learn."

"OK, Blodwen. I'll try."

"Do you need help to bring your things in, Huw?"

"No, Blodwen. I only have a small suitcase. I have to go back to London on Monday week to report to my superiors on whether I have found a suitable office."

"Can I help?"

"I think so. I need to go around the city centre tomorrow looking for a suitable shop. It doesn't have to be actually in the city centre but near it. All I need for the office is an area for a couple of desks and some filing cabinets. It would be great if I could live on the premises, but that isn't essential."

"OK, Huw. I'll be your guide tomorrow. But tonight? We're speaking Welsh."

+++

We did. Blodwen gave the words for everything we had at the meal and some of the grammar. She often laughed at my pronunciation of the Welsh words but by the end of the evening I had about thirty Welsh words in my memory and after frequent corrections by Blodwen, I could say them correctly. But she was teasing me frequently by saying things in Welsh that neither I nor her parents could understand.

At the end of the evening Blodwen switched back to English after she had kissed me frequently. I slept in the bed that was really too short for me, dreaming of what it might be like to be making love to Blodwen.

+++

During next morning's breakfast there were more Welsh lessons, When Blodwen and I went to the city centre I was relieved that Blodwen switched to English. There were many empty shop fronts in the city centre, but most were too large, lockups with no accommodation. There were a couple of possibilities, but I wasn't convinced.

We walked slightly beyond the city centre. There were a pair of semi-detached shops with parking for three cars outside each and the upper floors looked like flats. One was trading as an ironmonger's shop. The other one was empty with the windows boarded up. The ironmonger's shop had a small front area but extended back along the ground floor.

"This looks possible, Blodwen," I said." But there is no estate agent board or anything to show whether it is for rent or lease."

"The easy way, Huw, is to ask in the ironmongers. They must know something about next door."

We went in. I asked about the shop next door. The shopkeeper's face fell as I started to speak.

"It belongs to us, sir. But we have had three business fail during the last five years, going bankrupt and not paying or honouring their leases. We want to sell it, freehold, but..."

"But?" I prompted.

"We wouldn't be happy to sell it to a Sneasneg."

Blodwen laughed.

"He might sound like a Sneasneg, and he can't speak Welsh yet, but Huw Dafydd was born in Swansea of Welsh parents, grandparents and a long line of Welsh people for generations."

"Is that so?" the shopkeeper asked in Welsh.

I could understand those three words.

Blodwen responded in a torrent of Welsh that made the shopkeeper smile. He held it his hand to me.

"Huw, your lady has a fine and persuasive Welsh tongue on her, boyo. I'm convinced you are no Sneasneg. My name is Parry."

"Like the composer, Mr Parry?" I asked.

"Yes. I'm one of his many descendants but without the musical ability. I'll give you details of the estate agents. It's been on the market for two years, so they took the sign away when it blew down last winter."

+++

At the estate agents the only woman in the office had to search for the file in the cabinet drawer marked commercial. The file was dusty.

"We haven't had any enquiries about that place for over a year, Mr Hughes. There are too many commercial properties empty in Swansea. The owners dropped their price two years ago. Mr Parry telephoned a few minutes ago to say you were coming and that the price is still the reduced one. I had someone in the office making an enquiry about a residential property, so I hadn't had time to remind myself about the Parrys' property."

She opened the file and pulled out a sheet giving the property details: the shop and the flat above. Overleaf was a plan of the ground and upper floor with measurements. It seemed ideal but the shop would need renovation and new signs.

"There are two advantages, Mr Hughes. First, the property is just outside the conservation area so there should be little difficulty in getting planning permission for any changes you want to make. The second? The business rates and the residential rates are low, The business rates? It is away from the main trading area."

She produced a council statement showing the current rates, business and domestic. I was startled. They were both so low. I had been paying more for my one-bedroom flat in London.

"The council offers a fifty per cent reduction on the business rates for a new business for the first five years..."

I blinked. Half of next to nothing?

"The residential rates are in the lowest band but if you are the sole occupant, you get 25% off that..."

Three quarters of a very low rate?

"In their flat, which is a mirror image, the Parrys have converted the small fourth bedroom into an ensuite. They thought about doing that for this one too. I advised against it because there was no guarantee they would get their money back. Their business is sound and thriving because they are the only old-fashioned ironmonger's shop in Swansea, and they undercut the large DIY stores."

"OK, Mrs Simpson. I have to consult my employers at the beginning of next week, but that property could be suitable. What others have you got? Commercial shop fronts with accommodation?"

She had three more but much larger than I would need and more expensive for rates and running costs. The Parrys' place seemed like a bargain.

Mrs Simpson gave me the keys. I promised to return them before the agents shut at five pm.

I took Blodwen to a restaurant for lunch. Over the meal we discussed the Parrys' shop but decided we really needed to look around before I recommended it to my employers. But the low purchase price made me think. I had sold my flat in London at a London price. It still had a mortgage but thanks to parental help with the deposit and paying as much as I could each month, I had owned seventy per cent of it. That capital would be enough to buy the Parry's shop outright and pay for improvements to the living quarters.

Blodwen was startled that I had so much capital. As a teacher, even a qualified teacher, her pay wasn't fantastic -- good for Aberystwyth or even Swansea but a fraction of what I had been earning in London and even less now I would be a branch manager. She was renting a flat in Aberystwyth, living in it during term times and returning to her parents in school holidays.

+++

That evening I sent a long email to my employers in London with scanned copies of the details of the Parrys' property. I suggested that I could buy it myself if they would pay for the office/shop adaptations.

Blodwen gave me and her parents more Welsh lessons that evening. After the evening meal her parents were in the kitchen washing up. Blodwen taught me to say 'I love you' in Welsh. Every time I got it right, she repeated it before kissing me. That was a great way to learn Welsh.

That night I dreamed about Blodwen. I wanted to go further than we had gone but in her parents' house that was difficult. My car, a two-seater sports model was impossible because Blodwen and I are so large. Making love in the car would be impractical.

The next morning Blodwen and I walked around Swansea again, this time looking at tourist attractions, museums etc. I could see that Swansea was trying to improve itself, but the empty shop fronts showed that it still had some way to go.

We had lunch in a restaurant. I had an email from my employers. Not only did they accept my idea of buying the property myself, but they offered me a reduced rate mortgage of 40% of the valuation or asking price. They had set a budget of twenty thousand pounds for the changes to the business area. My available money meant that I would have enough capital for improvements to the living area.

We went back to the estate agents.

"Mrs Simpson, my employers have approved my proposed purchase. I would like the Parry's property at their asking price. My company's solicitors will act for me, and they are covering all my legal costs. Until then, if anyone else is interested, will you please let me know?"

"Will it be company owned, Mr Hughes?"

"No. I will be buying it, myself, Mrs Simpson, with financial help from my employers. I will be living above the shop."

"OK. I will ring the Parrys now."

She used a speaker phone. Mr Parry seemed delighted. I asked whether I and Blodwen could come to see them this afternoon. He agreed.

We went to see Mr Parry.

"Huw?" My Parry said. "I am very pleased you are buying it now. We were getting worried. The council is proposing to double the business rates on unoccupied commercial premises from next financial year. Most empty premises are owned by companies. The change is to encourage them to lower their fees for leases or rents. But it would have made next door a financial burden on us. Now it is being sold that it is a relief."

"I notice that you have shutters that close off the

shop front at night. Do you need them?"

"This shop, and next door, have a recessed doorway. Until I put the shutters on, drunks used to urinate in it and some homeless people would try to sleep among the piss."

"OK, Mr Parry, thank you. I will probably make a continuous flat frontage, but shutters would be a good idea. Do you know who installed your shutters?"

"Yes. They are mainly general builders. They do shop fitting and they do shutters as well. I forgot -- they are based up in the valleys and most of them speak Welsh. How's your Welsh now, Huw?"

"I can say a few sentences such as 'I don't speak much Welsh' but I am learning'."

I had said all that in Welsh.

"That's amazing, boyo, for just a couple of days."

"I have a good teacher. If she is still around, she can talk to the shop fitters or maybe by then I could. But although I or Blodwen will speak to them, I will need to wait until the purchase is completed and after I have spoken to the council before the work can start."

+++

The purchase was completed with a month. Blodwen had agreed in Welsh, what needed to be done with the builders.

It took me months until I had cleared all the works with the council. Because the shop was outside the conservation area, I didn't need planning permission only to do the work according to the building regulations. But correspondence with the council was very slow.

Blodwen had ended her summer holiday and returned to Aberystwyth while I was still corresponding with the council. While she was away, I and her parents had enrolled in an evening class for Welsh beginners. By the time she returned at Christmas all three of us had a reasonable competence and practised at home.

Blodwen was teasing me. We couldn't do much in her parents' home. It was too small with thin walls. We could do even less in my sports car. Until my flat was habitable Blodwen would only kiss and cuddle me. She also insisted that any verbal love making had to be in Welsh -- not covered by the evening class. I was frustrated and Blodwen knew I was.

The council had asked, but not required me, to make my new shutters decorative with a mural as they had done for empty boarded up shops within the city centre. The local Art college could do that for a stupidly low sum. I agreed with Mr Parry that his shutters could be painted as well and I would pay.

I had started my branch business from my bedroom in the Owens' house. I had a business telephone and fibre broadband. By the middle of March, I had twenty business customers and for none of them had I had to use my improving Welsh. I had planned to open the shop on a Monday morning early in April with some of my London bosses present but for the preceding April 1st I had arranged a party in the shop for the Owens (and Blodwen) the Parrys, some of the council staff who had helped, and the shop fitters who had done a brilliant job.

I had employed a local catering company to provide the food and drinks. The event was a great success. Mr Parry, despite his claim of not being musical, had played the piano and everyone sang in Welsh and English, getting ruder as the evening progressed.

When everyone had left except the Owens and Parrys, I got down on my knee in front of Blodwen and asked her, in fluent Welsh, to marry me. The others cheered as Blodwen accepted my proposal in Welsh.

Then she said, in English:

"Huw? I've been mean to you. Today is April Fool's Day. I would have accepted your proposal even if you couldn't speak a word of Welsh. But, because you love me, you have tried hard, and you are much more fluent in Welsh than I had expected. That shows your dedication and how much you want me. But I am glad I am marrying a Welsh-speaking April Fool, who is a fool only because of his love."

That evening in my new King size bed in my refurbished apartment Blodwen showed me the physical love she had been withholding all these months.

On the Monday, it was the official opening of my insurance branch office. I had leafletted the town with the announcement in English and Welsh. I had recruited one of Blodwen's teacher training friends, Cerys, who was a qualified music teacher. After her first year as a trainee, the school had decided they couldn't afford a music teacher, so she had bene unemployed. She had accepted a post starting in September so was willing to work for me, as a Welsh-speaking assistant until the start of the Autumn term.

I had made a production of the opening. Several of my London bosses had come to Swansea. A local catering company had provided nibbles with an emphasis of Welsh products and drink, including Welsh made whisky and a variety of Welsh beers. As Cerys was a music teacher, I had acquired a good quality upright piano. She accompanied the Swansea male voice choir as they sang many traditional Welsh songs.

I had intended that the choir would sing outside but it is Wales. Early in April, it rained, of course, so we were very crowded in the shop front. After the Male voice choir had performed, Blodwen and I performed one of Joseph Parry's most famous Welsh Duets: Hywel a Blodwen, in which the tenor declares his love for Blodwen.