Welsh is a beautiful language, and the Welsh people are proud to speak it. If you’re visiting Pembrokeshire, Ceredigion or Carmarthenshire, take the time to learn some Welsh for your next visit, it’s always greatly appreciated!
Greetings
First off, what do we call ourselves? You’ll see Croeso y Cymru on the road signs as you cross the border and it means Welcome to Wales. Cymru is pronounced ‘kumm-ree’. We speak Welsh – Cymraeg – ‘kumm-rye-g’.
We’re generally friendly folk and you’ll often hear a chirpy ‘Bore da’ as you walk down the street – it means Good Morning and is pronounced ‘boreh-dah’. You can also try ‘shwmae’ (shuh-my) for hello.
There’s also prynhawn da – Good afternoon (prin-how’n-dah) and nos da – Good night (nohs-dah)
Ps & Qs
We all like to thank our shopkeepers and bus drivers. Aside from ‘Cheers Drive!’ the proper Welsh would be Diolch (dee-olch) for thanks; or diolch yn fawr (dee-olch-un-vow-er) for thank you very much.
Please can be a bit trickier. The Welsh os gwelwch yn dda (oss-gwell-ock-un-thar) translates more literally as ‘if you see well’ or, if you see fit’ but is used for please. Croeso (croy-so) is welcome; hwyl fawr (hoil vow-er) is goodbye, yes is ydw (uh-doo) and no is a simple na (nah).
Place names
Placenames in Welsh are often very logical – once you know that Aber means river mouth/estuary, for instance, you can work out that Abertawe (Swansea) literally means ‘Mouth of the River Tawe).
As you travel through Wales, use this list to work out the meanings behind some of our place names:
Llan – Place                   Capel – chapel              Traeth – beach
Castell – castle                 Croes – cross                Afon – River
Dinas – hill-fortress           Aber – river mouth           Fferm – farm
Cwm – Valley                 Eglwys – Church             Fforest – forest
Road Signs
Arafwch – Slow down
Araf – Slow
Ffordd Ar Gau – Road Closed
Unffordd – One Way
Numbers
1 – Un – een
2 – Dau – die
3 – Tri – tree
4 – Pedwar – ped-war (to rhyme with car)
5 – Pump – pimp
6 – Chwech – queck
7 – Saith – sithe
8 – Wyth – oi-th
9 – Naw – now
10 – Deg – deg
Colours
Red: Coch (cork)
Orange: Oren (oren)
Yellow: Melyn (mellin)
Green: Gwyrdd (gw-air-th)
Blue: Glas (glass, to rhyme with gas)
Purple: Porffor (por-four)
White: Gwyn (gwin)
Black: Du (dee)