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What Happens When You Can’t Answer the Question ‘Where Are You From?’
Living with a muddy sense of belonging and identity in a world that loves to ask
My nieces line up as if on stage. This is an important moment, one their Nain — the North Walean name for Grandmother — specifically asked for on her 80th birthday.
A performance in Welsh.
In this house, it has to be Welsh. It’s a cherished language. A connection between my mother, me, my brother, and my nieces to our heritage.
Unkempt soldiers, ruffled at the seams, stop their English conversation, switching to Welsh in one fluid motion. The lilting words of the old nursery rhyme Lili Wen Fach — little snowdrop — fill the room.
It’s always a surprise to hear Welsh words tumble from these girls’ mouths as effortlessly as English tumbles from mine. English is my family’s first language. It’s my nieces’ too. But they are bilingual babies, living as they do in the region with the highest percentage of Welsh speakers in the country.
Welsh is important in these parts, so they learned it. It’s the only language they speak at school. With friends. With older neighbours in the village. It’s part of who they are and bonds them to their community.
