Kerry had kindly left her computer here so that we could use the internet so while the rest of the household slept, Keith had been able to do some more research into the possibility of Tanzania and to catch up on some emails. Badly behind on the blog, I was to continue to fall further behind when our laptop keyboard decided to work spasmodically and then not at all. Eventually we bought a cheap external keyboard which I am typing on now, so, for those who thought that we had been swallowed by the Barnsley monster, it was nothing so interesting that made us appear to have disappeared.
We spent our first day lazing about and getting to know Maureen and Dean. We hadn’t realised quite how much our hectic pace in Paris had taken out of us so it was wonderful to have a complete day of rest. Maureen devoted herself to pampering us which was lovely. Listening to everyone speaking is a treat in itself, a bit like we have landed in a delightful television series set in Yorkshire. Sometimes I have to concentrate when everyone speaks quickly and there are some expressions that I have to ask about. Some examples are ‘mesen’ (myself), ‘from Tarn’ (from town but actually only Barnsley town centre), and the use of ‘our’ in front of names for family members. Definite articles seem to be omitted but there's sometimes a token 't' before the word, as in ‘There’s trouble at mill,’ or 'E wo walkin downt street.' ‘Aught’ means anything. Plurals sometimes don’t have an ‘s’ on the end and wo means was ‘It wo twenty mile away.’ ‘Aye, lads and lasses’ is used for yes, boys and girls. ‘Ayup oryou awright?’ means ‘Hello, how are you? ‘Will you have your bacon cruzzled?’ (crispy around the edges) A tea cake is a plain roll here but a barn is a normal teacake in Sheffield and a tea cake there is what in Barnsley would be called a fruit tea cake. ‘If you don’t giower I will gi thee a clout’ means ‘If you stop that I will hit you.’ ‘A crack with the hairy side of the hand’ is a joke and means that there will be no evidence and no finger prints. A good reply is ‘If you carry on I’ll poke thee in eye with a fork.’ 'H's are routinely dropped, so their neice, Hannah, is always called 'Anna'.
People in nearby villages speak distinctively, with a speaker from Royston a mile away being easily picked out. Even Cudworth just up the road has a difference in speech from this area of Monk Bretton, and from tarn. Greater still are the variations between Barnsley, Leeds, Sheffield, Newcastle and Manchester – the major towns, with the groups being called slang names. The people from Shelffield, the home of steel and snooker, are known as the ‘dee dars’ because of their speech patterns. Newcastle folk are called Geordies, Mancurians are from Manchester and Liverpudlians are from Liverpool. Others call the Barnsley people ‘Dingles’ after a family of very rough types in a TV program, and even people from Barnsley say that they speak ‘right common’. A possible reason for the differences in language is that people didn’t mix between steel and coal communities, and then on a smaller scale, each village might serve their own pit or work place, with not too much mixing. Of course things have changed now but the language patterns still remain.
Madge and Mel called over, having been to a car boot sale. It turns out that everywhere in Barnsley is two mile away - we are two mile from tarn and two mile from Madge’s which is two mile from Mel’s. We met Kerry’s two turtles who eat loads and who were so overwhelmed at having Australians in their lounge room that they disgraced themselves on the floor. They are very tame and just loved being stroked on their necks.
Late in the afternoon we went for a walk with Rohan to look over the valley towards Tarn. Slipping off the road side and down a public footpath we were in another world of fields, wild flowers, woods, ripe and unsprayed blackberries and thousands of stinging nettles. The summer ground was springy and moist. Just behind the rows of houses it was all countryside stretching for more than two mile, I am sure. Rohan took as to a hill overlooking the Dearne River valley with the hospital shining white on the opposite hill and the town hall clock visible but not readable, nearby.
That evening we were home alone with Rohan, which was very thoughtful of the family and it was a good chance to catch up and just to enjoy being with him. Our introduction to Barnsley and the family had been slow and relaxing, and such a contrast to our last few frantic days in Paris.
No comments:
Post a Comment