Read the headline, 'Municipality: the bi-lingual wishes'; that is the annual Mayor's address wishing a Happy New Year to all the inhabitants of the village; I instinctively took it to mean Breton and French but then I read that an English local Councillor was allowed to give a translation for her compatriots; that is completely up to them but It's a pity that there was no room for 'Breton' given that it is the first language of the elder inhabitants in this particular part of Brittany. In the 1930's 1,200,000 people spoke the language, then the schoolchildren were forbidden to spit on the floor and to speak Breton, now you can't even get a 'Happy New Year' and do you know what? they don't care! In Wales there's an expression "Cymro gorau, Cymro oddigartref" which means "The best Welshman is a Welshman away from home" I think it applies to a lesser extent now, with every thing that is going on over there, but I remember the Welsh speakers in the town where I come from completely against having the Language rammed down our throats, being totally ignorant of the problem. In some ways it's the same here in Brittany with outsiders sometimes being the most active* and non Breton speakers sending their children to the new Breton language schools.*An Englishman was the President of the Breton schools movement a few years ago and the most active person around here was born outside Brittany.





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