Alongside Welsh, I have also been brushing up on my GCSE French and hoping to improve my German (although I've already given up on this).

These languages have highlighted two more things I like about Welsh and that I think make it an easier language for the beginner:

1. The present continuous (I am going; I am doing; We are sailing (across the sea...))

In English, we have this periphrastic construction for the continuous tense that involves using "to be" as an auxilliary verb. This construction is alien to other European languages who simply use the present tense form of whatever verb, for example "to go", to indicate all three of the following ideas:

I go
I am going
I do go

In French, all three are "je vais". On the DuoLingo forum you see beginners in non-Welsh languages ask "Where is "am" in this sentence?" or asking "Why is it not 'Je suis vais'?".

Welsh, similarly to English, also forms the present tense periphrastically with "bod" (to be), almost in the opposite way to French by including the auxilliary where in English it *wouldn't* be needed:

Dw i'n mynd (literally "Am I going")

is

I am going
I go
I do go

and I think that inclusion of "am" (dw, in this case) is a more familiar construct to the English speaker, despite the reverse word order.

2. The same pronouns are used for both the nominative and accusative case.

What I mean by this is that "he" and "him" are both the same word, as are "She" and "her" (although not "her" the possessive pronoun), and "We" and "us".

For example:

Maen nhw'n mwynhau'r ddrama (they enjoy the play) - Nominative

Uses the same pronoun as:

Paid ag anghofio nhw! (don't forget them!) - Accusative

In French, "them" can be "ils" or "elles" or even "eux" in the nominative and "les" in the accusative.

The more Welsh I learn, the more I think it's a lot easier than people give it credit for. That said, it's not without its own strange constructs!

Christmas has been and gone and I've now got a small collection of Welsh books aimed at learners. I already had "Ffenestri" by Lois Arnold, and I now have two Bethan Gwanas books to add to my growing library: "Yn ei Gwsg" and "Bywyd Blodwen Jones".

I've started the Blodwen Jones one, but to my shame I have only made it about three pages in. It's not because it's too difficult (it's actually about right for me), it's because life, as it is wont to do, has taken over.

That's also why I haven't been updating this blog very often: I just don't find the time.

My Welsh learning is still continuing apace though. My DuoLingo tree is now almost entirely level five (nothing below a four) and I've moved onto level two on Say Something In Welsh. The range of things I can say in Welsh now far outstrips what I can say in French, and I started learning that when I was 11 at school!

What I lack is someone to speak Welsh with. No one else in the house is interested in learning, and I suspect wouldn't stick with it long if they did. It may be time to venture out and maybe go to a meet up in Bristol or Casnewydd.

This is something I've started feeling quite strongly about lately, although I admit I'm partial to a bit of bias given my current enthusiasm for Cymraeg, but...

...why don't we teach Welsh as a second language in England? I say England because in Scotland and Northern Ireland they already have native languages that should be taught, but England does not.

I know some people will think, "Are you mad?!" but hear me out; my reasoning is sound:

1. Many children are more likely to visit Wales than Germany. German is taught in many British schools, yet British tourists to Germany number around 2 million per year compared to 10 million in Wales (2015 figure). This means more chance to practice a language learnt in school.

2. Welsh is the language of these islands. English people may not appreciate this, but our ancestors spoke something similar to Welsh. Before the Romans, Saxons and then Normans invaded, the native languages of these islands were the Brythonic languages, of these Welsh is the one currently in the healthiest state. Learning Welsh is a link to our past, even as Englishmen.

3. Learning any language has benefits beyond just that language. Learning one language helps a child understand other languages and their own language much better. There is nothing to be lost by learning Welsh and much to be gained.

4. Welsh is different. Welsh is not like French, German or Spanish; the languages children usually learn in school. The structure is different and it borrows little from Romance or Germanic languages. Learning Welsh gives children a different perspective on language learning yet remains relevant as it's spoken as a living language by 700,000 people and is an official language of the UK, unlike Cantonese, Mandarin or Satsuma ;)

5. Welsh is easy. Well, sort of. As I've covered previously, simple Welsh sentences in the past, present and future tenses can involve very little conjugation beyond the verb "bod" (to be). This makes progress fast and enthuses children to learn. Why spend two years mastering present tense conjugations in French when you can learn the same sentences in Welsh in a fraction of the time?

Not everyone will agree with me. I know the counter argument will be "but more people speak language X than speak Welsh!" or the usual "Welsh is a dead language! What's the point?!". But Welsh is growing. By teaching it as a second language it will grow more and these questions will answer themselves.

If you're learning a language, one of the best ways to gain exposure to that language and increase fluency is to visit a country where that language is spoken.

Herein lies the problem with Welsh: not all Welsh people speak it. They all speak English, but only around 20% of the population speaks Welsh. This means that if I'm in Wales, I can't initiate a conversation in Welsh because I can't guarantee that the other person will be a Welsh speaker.

Such a situation, where a native does not speak the native language, would be inconceivable in most other countries.

The fact that there are no monoglot Welsh speakers remaining also doesn't help. Because everyone speaks English fluently there's less incentive to make the effort to learn and speak Welsh.

Then there's the problem with signage. In France, other than at some touristy areas, all signs are in French. Signs alerting me to the "dèrniere sortie avant péage" will do so only in French. Translating and understanding the signs becomes part of the learning experience. Unfortunately, in Wales most signs are bilingual. The order of the languages is left to the discretion of the local authority, but an English translation will be on the sign somewhere. On the one hand, this allows you to quickly confirm that your translation of the Welsh was correct. On the other, it takes a lot of the fun and the necessity out of translating in the first place. It's very hard not to notice the English accidentally before you've had chance to attempt the Welsh.

What I have discovered, to my surprise and delight, is that several of my colleagues speak varying levels of Welsh. Remember, this is Somerset, England, not the north of Wales, so it's not entirely expected. One even speaks fluent Welsh, having attended a Welsh medium school. And he's said he's always happy to help with my Welsh learning.

So things are looking up.

Here's an odd one: the Welsh have no word for "to have", as in to possess something.

The Welsh, though, are a resourceful lot and get around this apparent limitation by saying that something is "with" something else.

I do not have a ball, a ball is with me. Likewise, a new house is with me; a girlfriend is with me; even a beard is with me.

The concept isn't complicated, but I find it tricky to get the word order right. During a conversation at work, I was asked if I knew how to say "The red dog has a ball" in Welsh. I had to think about this. Is the red ball with the dog, or is the dog with the red ball? I eventually settled on the former: mae pêl gyda'r ci coch. I think that's right.

It doesn't trip off my tongue quite as easily as it would in, say, French: Le chien rouge a un ballon. It's a little clumsy and awkward, but that's part of the charm.

This problem isn't limited to possessing an object (or a girlfriend) though. It rears its head when talking about health too. You don't have a sore throat, there is a sore throat with you. You do not have a cold, there is a cold "on you": Mae annwyd arna i.

Let's hope I don't get sick while in Wales; this might take some getting used to.

One of the more daunting things about Welsh which is common to all the Celtic languages is the concept of mutations: consonants that change to a different letter, or even group of letters, depending on context.

As an English speaker and someone who has learnt German and French in the past, this is a truly alien concept. German may have given us some pretty monstrous words, but at least they're always spelt the same way whenever you encounter them. The French may be sloppy when pronouncing the ends of their words, but at least the beginnings don't go changing.

In Welsh, however, certain initial consonants of words change to other consonants. This is a mutation, and exists in all the Celtic languages of the British Isles in various forms. Welsh has three types of mutation: soft, nasal and aspirate (which I won't go into here). The most common of these is the soft mutation. What this means, in practical terms, is that in certain circumstances the following letter changes occur at the start of a word:

c becomes g

p becomes b

t becomes d

d becomes dd

b and m become f

ll becomes l

rh becomes r

and g vanishes entirely!

One of the occasions these mutations occur is when a singular feminine noun follows the definite article "Y". So "cath" (a cat) becomes "y gath" (the cat). "Mam" (Mother) becomes "y fam" (the Mother). And so on. This change also occurs when we are going "from" or "to" somewhere. If we go "to Wales", for example, it's "i Gymru" with the usual C replaced by a G. I'm still getting accustomed to the various reasons for the soft mutation, and there are lots of them.

Then we have the nasal mutation. This is much less common, and comprises the following consonant changes, which I had to look up because they're not all yet very natural to me:

p -> mh

t -> nh

c -> ngh

b -> m

d -> n

g -> ng

I've principally encountered this mutation when saying I am "in" somewhere. As with the Cymru -> Gymru change above when we go to Wales, we change C to Ngh when we are in Wales. So one can like Cymru, go to Gymru, but be in Nghymru... argh! Still, all languages have their quirks, and the world would be a very boring place without these differences.

The purpose of mutations, so I've been led to believe, is to improve the flow of the language. I kind of buy that. Kind of. I can see that the words trip off the tongue a little better in the case of the nasal mutation ("my car" would be "fy car" ("vuh car") without the change but becomes "fy nghar" ("vunghar") with it), but I can't really see how abitrary changes to feminine singular nouns help the flow.

Still, it is what it is, and it's all part of language's rich tapestry!

The first tense I'm learning in Welsh is the present tense. When I started learning Welsh I held the opinion that it was a difficult language full of complicated constructs that I'd struggle to learn compared to French, Spanish or German.

Turns out I was wrong. Forming the present tense in modern colloquial Welsh (literary Welsh is quite different) is probably the easiest of any language I've learnt. The reason is thus: all simple present tense sentences involve conjugation of the same verb, "bod" (to be) followed by your action verb in its infinitive form (called a verb-noun, in Welsh).

So, where in French you'd need to know the first person singular and plural, second person singular and plural, and third person singular and plural forms of every verb you want to use, in Welsh you need only know the various conjugations of bod and the infinitive form of the other verb.

"I am swimming" is "Dw i'n nofio", where "dw" is the form of bod and nofio is to swim.

"He is swimming" is "Mae e'n nofio". "She is swimming" is "Mae hi'n nofio".

"I am eating" is "Dw i'n bwyta". "He is eating" is "Mae e'n bwyta".

And I really love this about Welsh. Forming a whole range of new sentences only involves learning one form of each new verb. It's so wonderfully consistent, and it lets you feel you're making progress almost instantly.

Welsh, like most European languages, assigns nouns a gender. Some of these are obvious: a man (dyn) is masculine. A woman (menyw or dynes) is feminine. A cat (cath) is feminine. A dog (ci) is masculine. Well, that makes sense to me, at least.

But what's a table? Or a bed? Or love?

And how do we differentiate between them? And how do we learn the gender of a new object?

Well, in other European languages you can tell whether a noun is masculine or feminine by the article in front of it. In French, we have the indefinite articles "un" and "une" and the definite articles "le" and "la". When you learn a new word you also learn the gender. While on holiday in Paris in 2003 I asked "Qu'est-ce que c'est?" while holder up a token to use the toilet in a bar, and I got the answer "un jeton". Un. Masculine. And I've never forgotten that a token, in French, is masculine: "un jeton".

So what about Welsh? Welsh doesn't have an indefinite article at all. There is no way of saying "a table" or "an apple", it's just "bwrdd" and "afal". There IS a definite article ("the table" or "the apple") and it has three forms:

Y for words following and preceding a consonant

Yr for words preceding a vowel, but following a consonant

'r for words following a vowel (regardless of what follows it)

Sadly, none of these differentiate by gender, so it's almost impossible when learning a new word as part of conversation or when reading to tell whether it's masculine or feminine. And it's this that is, so far, the most frustrating thing about learning Welsh. I find myself looking up words that I already know just to determine their gender. While writing this I had to check to see if "coffi" (coffee) is feminine (it isn't).

So, does that matter? Well, yes! Welsh also has no gender-neutral word for "it". When talking about an object you refer to it as either he or she depending on its gender. When talking about the weather, for example, you refer to "she". "Mae hi'n oer" is "it's cold", only it's really "she's cold". And not only that, but certain words mutate in certain ways depending on context and gender. Would a Welsh person understand you if you were to get a gender wrong? Yes, of course. But it would grate. It wouldn't sound right. And if I'm going to learn a language, I'm going to do it right.