Spotlight
40
Intercultural Relationships:
The Beauty
I never thought I’d date an English girl. That was, until one fateful night at Liveys in December 2022 (during which I was fittingly dressed as Jesus). After a Christmas period of incessant messaging, and a few dates, my worst fears were confirmed – I had an English girlfriend! Jokes aside, I was excited to share with her all the best aspects of Welsh culture. With sports being very important to me, taking her to watch Wales play football at the Cardiff City Stadium was a highlight of my summer last year, despite the hammering from Armenia which left our Euro qualification dreams in tatters. The buzzing concourse of the stadium before the game was a sea of red, with a wave of Cymreictod, or Welshness, washing over us as we stood for the rousing national anthem, which was sure to stir the heart of any listener, Welsh or not. But such is the nature of being Welsh – we are a welcoming people with a love for singing! The summer also meant a trip to my hometown of Aberystwyth, coming with a choice of beaches, and immersion into West Wales life! This meant introducing my girlfriend to Welsh phrases which I’d commonly use with my family – as despite my dad being brought up speaking exclusively Welsh, we speak mostly English at home with the odd Welsh phrase thrown in! This proved no problem, and we now incorporate Welsh language greetings into our every day, with “Nos da” replacing “Goodnight” and our mornings starting with a cheeky “Bore da”. Winter rolling around meant only one thing – that it was time for me to introduce her to cawl – or Welsh stew, consisting of beef (traditionally lamb) and vegetables (including leeks!). Respecting our two cultures, we have also decided to celebrate both St. Valentine’s Day as well as the Welsh counterpart, Dydd Santes Dwynwen on the 25th of January. While not as stark as some, there are distinct cultural differences between England and Wales, but we don’t let these come between us (until the Six Nations start!), and it has been a pleasure to incorporate both into our relationship. words by: Will Davies
Shared My boyfriend is Welsh, raised by a tangentially Irish mother and a British father. I am Barbadian, raised by a British mother and a Barbadian father. Both of us are missing the accents that denote where we came from, his voice would place him somewhere in the midlands, and he insists that I sound more American than anything else. There are parts of Welsh culture that are clearly represented in him, like an insistence that I try homemade Welsh cakes, and a handful of Welsh words he learned in high school. Just as there is a Caribbean twinge in me, in the way I become almost incomprehensible when I am angry, or how I will make peppermint tea for any ailment and expect it to perform miracles. However, neither of us are accurate representations of our respective cultures, so I have never considered how we share them with each other. It has such a broad definition that I feel entitled to make my own: I honestly believe culture is ephemeral, it doesn’t have actions so much as it has spaces. It’s your world. You experience this, experience them, by seeing where they’ve been. I feel like Waterloo Gardens is a part of his culture because it is so near where he grew up and he’s walked through it so many times. Maybe it’s more akin to Welsh culture when daffodils are sprouting up from the ground, but it’s his culture regardless. When I frame it this way, he is always sharing his culture with me, because I live in his city. I show him my culture through photographs. When I go home, I drive around and attempt to capture every inch of my world with a camera lens. Occasionally there is socca playing in the background of a video but it’s less representative of me than this one cliff where the Atlantic breaks on land. I show him the flatbed trucks full of coconuts on the side of the highway, and then men with machetes that hack them open for the water. I look forward to the day I can share my culture with him the same way he shares his with me. words by: Alanna Wilson-Patrick ‘Sabine’ design by: Eszter Gurbicz