A medley

I should expect London to be noisy, but this is ridiculous. I am in the Wellington Hotel by a main road junction very close to Waterloo station. I am provided with shampoo, shower gel - so far, so normal - and ear plugs! These would be great if I could hear my morning alarm with them stuffed in my ears. I may have to take the risk as the ambulance and police sirens are piercing and the buses moving off from the traffic lights growl like wild cats in a temper.

I had almost forgotten what a concrete and asphalt maze this bustling city is. There are oases of green here and there, which is a great relief. The description given to London by William Cobbett in the 1820s, as the 'great wen', is perhaps a little harsh, but there is truth in it nevertheless. A 'wen', of course, is a type of cyst or boil.

Maybe all this just means I have become the ultimate country bumpkin, a small minded peasant or village idiot, but I could not work in London again. Let me get home to north Wales to my family, my friends, my hens, my sea and my mountains. The Welsh word 'hiraeth' has no easy English translation but represents a longing for the spiritual home.

If I am truly honest, this spiritual home, for me, is Gloucestershire with its honey coloured limestone, its Morris dancing, its rounded rolling vowels, its scrumpy cider, its great sweeping River Severn and the secret Forest of Dean where I heard the pixies singing all those years ago. Don't ask - much too complicated. Yet this feels so long ago, as if in another life, another being.

Most of the time I love North Wales and I like conversing in Welsh. My own language of English is so dominant the world over, so vital as a language of business and commerce, that it inevitably imposes itself irresistibly within this island and beyond. However, I respect the Welsh culture and want to support and promote it by using the Welsh language, which is spoken by about 20% of the population of Wales. There are moments, though, when I feel put down for being English and that makes me indignant. I have as much right to be proud of my own culture as anyone else and I welcome the opportunity for us all to learn from each each other. A cosmopolitan world is an enriching world. I cannot cope with a parochial raise-the-drawbridge attitude which exemplifies intolerance and a victim mentality, shown by a few in North Wales, which will lead to an ever declining influence in the world and a besieged state. The words of the metaphysical poet John Donne spring to mind:

No man is an island, entire of itself
every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main
if a clod be washed away by the sea,
Europe is the less, as well as if a promontory were,
as well as if a manor of thy friends or of thine own were
any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind
and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls
it tolls for thee.

We are all in this life together, so let's make the best of it for each other and for ourselves. I will reflect on all this as I lie in bed listening to the traffic through the night.
Hiraeth