Well, here we are, nearly three weeks and two lessons in. It took me about ten days to master seven words/phrases. Then there was a bit of an epiphany and suddenly more words began to stick. I do find it easier to remember nouns, rather than abstract concepts and phrases. I’ve got basic colours sorted. It is interesting that, despite Cornish being an ancient language, there are words for things like car, or hyperlink, that didn’t exist when Cornish was last spoken as a first language. Disclaimer – I have no idea what the Cornish for hyperlink is but it is in the dictionary. The Cornish for place names is also fascinating. For example, Falmouth becomes Aberfal, aber being ‘mouth’, as in Aberystwyth or Aberdeen.

Writing and reading, rather than listening seems to be the way to go. I am up to about sixty flash cards now and can cope with English to Cornish and Cornish to English. Simple sentences are harder. I can just about manage ‘the house is red’ (except you say ‘red is the house’), ‘the sea is blue’ and so on. All cool phrases but probably not hugely useful in the great scheme of things.

I am trying to crack the spelling by writing things out. Cornish is pretty consonant heavy and I have to remember that th is spelt dh and ch gh. I have been slightly confused by my recent few days being exposed to Welsh signage, to the extent that I started to think I was learning Welsh instead. There was however a proud moment when chatting to a National Trust guide about Welsh and Cornish, when he used a Welsh word for ‘splendid’ and I recognised it!

So, onwards and upwards. Next week is weather. Oh and I can now say duw genowgh.