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Published: January 19th 2007
Without a doubt, my main reason for wanting to travel in South America was to visit Patagonia, in search of the Welsh. My head was full of romantic notions of the heroic Welsh settlers of 1865 , crossing the Atlantic in search of a land where they could preserve their language, way of life and religion, free from persecution. We took the bus North from Rio Gallegos to Trelew, and could not help but wonder, during that 24 hours of nothingness, what possessed them to choose such a dry and barren land, so disimilar to Wales? Diolch i Dduw for the Tehuelche Indians, without whose help, those first immigrants would have starved to death.
We headed straight for Gaiman, the most Welsh of the villages. On the bus we met a girl called Eirian, sporting a "Soy Galesa, no soy Inglesa" t-shirt. Good girl. I was jealous and wanted one of my own. She was back for a second visit , having worked in the Gaiman's Welsh Ysgol Feithrin or Nursery last year. Randomly, she turned out to be from Cardiff and the daughter of someone my mother works with.
For the first time in the whole trip, accomodation
Hiroes i'r Iaith Gymraeg!
Me and Anna, the owner of Breuddwyd tea shop and cousin of Olwen Rees!was a problem. The reason for this is that all the Argentinians are on holiday now. (Why they would want to visit Gaiman is another question?!) We finally struck lucky with Plas y Coed, a B&B attached to the Breuddwyd (Dream) tea shop. It was great and I was overjoyed to find that Anna, the owner, was a fluent Welsh speaker, as well as the great grand daughter of the owner of the Gaiman's first tea shop. Even more randomly, and proving that everyone in Wales and its Patagonian equivalent, knows everyone else, Anna told me that she is a cousin of Olwen Rees. Olwen Rees taught me in school and lives next door to my best friend from Caerphilly, Becky. Like I said, random!
The Patagonian Welsh tea shop is something else entirely. We ordered a Welsh tea and could not believe the amount of cakes, scones, bara brith and bread and jam that arrived. In fact, the food in the Gaiman was a real plus (as well as being the main thing to do) and Joe managed to surpass all previous records by eating 4 pieces of apple pie in one day, all on separate occasions. The
Tea for two
I suspect the Gaiman has similar public health issues to South Wales! walls of Breuddwyd tea shop are decorated with Welsh Love Spoons and a vast assortment of Welsh tea towels to amuse the tourists. The sight of pictures of Caerphilly Castle, Trwyn y Gwynt in Aberystyth and the words to Calon Lan were enough to reduce me to a jibbering , homesick, emotional wreck! Anna was clearly used to such reactions although Joe now has firm confirmation of the fact that his wife is mad.
It was incredibly hot as we wandered around the village. Everything was shut for a siesta between 12 and 4 , except for a few tea houses which we hopped between, sampling the delicacies on offer and suffering the wailings of James Blunt and some Irish folk music. No Dafydd Iwan or Tom Jones here. Heol Michael D. Jones seems to be to the Gaiman, what Pontcanna is to Cardiff , with all the Welsh people apparently living on one street. They all seemed to be asleep or on holiday when we visited though, as most of the blinds were down. Nevertheless, I enjoyed seeking out the Welsh signs and visiting the Chapel, where there were several familiar names in the visitors book. I was
Could be Wales ...
House of John Caredig Evans , 1837-1913, the first Welsh minister in the Gaiman. disappointed to learn that they only hold religious services in Welsh when a visiting preacher comes over from Wales, although there is a Welsh choir.
At 3 pm the Museum opened and I met Fabio Trevor, another fluent Welsh speaker, who told me Welsh is now taught at the school in the Gaiman as a second language. Teachers are seconded from Wales to teach adults who want to learn as well as children. Interestingly, the Welsh Assembly Goverment is paying 105,000 pounds towards this over 3 years in a bid to promote the Welsh language and culture in Patagonia. This seems to be working. Anna, who I mentioned earlier, spent two months in Lampeter, last year , learning Welsh and most of the Welsh speakers I met were young. Fabio told me that at least 200 speak Welsh around the Gaiman, but I had difficulty finding them! I was armed with my brother´s Welsh language pocket guidebook to Patagonia and went into several establishments asking for people who spoke Welsh, but to no avail. I was sad to miss the curator of the Museo Historico Regional Gales, an octogenarian who was away that day, doing her weekly Welsh radio
programme!
After the Gaiman we moved on to Trelew, the regional capital, named after Lewis Jones, one of the original settlers. The best things about this city were again it´s food (even for veggies) and its excellent dinosaur museum. The regional museum had interesting histories of the Welsh immigrants, including one woman who arrived in Patagonia when she was 38 weeks pregnant! Other than this and the Welsh flag in the Italian restaurant there was very little to remind me of home. On the plus side, most Argentinians, be they from Patagonia or elsewhere, have heard of Wales and understand it´s distinctiveness from England.
Cymru am byth!
Cofion annwyl,
Nos X
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Robert
non-member comment
Great to read and see. Would love to add such a visit to my trip to Argentina.