Mishearings...
The Welsh word for wine is "Gwin" (said: gween). As we have learned in week 1, if you like wine, and would like to tell people this, you'd say, "Dw i'n hoffi gwin coch." ("coch" is said, like "Kahch", with that nice German "ch "sound at the end.) You'll want to remember that later.
In 2004, when I was in Europe with Beth and E we played a game. The rules of the game were thus: When you mishear someone, you give them a puzzled look and then repeat what you think you heard them say. For example, while we were in Barcelona, I said, "I think this side street connects to our alley way." But, E heard, "Does this kid's salad contemplate the literati?" You can see why it is an amusing game. I still like to play it. Earlier today John said to me, "I think I have collected some more bugs." At least, that is what I thought he said. What had actually come out of his mouth was, "Could you hand me the cotton wool buds."
The first week of Welsh class, we spent a lot of time telling each other the two or three things we knew how to say in Welsh that we liked. One of my classmates didn't come to class on Thursday. We turned up at the Humanities building at the same time and I waited for her while she chained up her bike. As we walked into the building together she said, "What did I miss yesterday? I just couldn't manage getting up yesterday morning. I went out with some friends on Wednesday night and just had too much green cock." A puzzled look crossed my face. My first thought was, "Wow. That is really open of her." It was immediately followed by the thought, "This is too early in the morning to be talking about sex toys with a stranger." Then she stopped walking and said, "No. That can't be right. Greeno cock? Gwin coch?" Realization dawned on me.
"Ah," I said. "That's competely understandable. Gwin has that way of creeping up on you." I was very grateful that I hadn't decided, in that moment, to play the game.
