Marty and I had some time to kill before the Cymru A’r Byd reception, so we settled into a nice restaurant tent, cafeteria style, and he went off to find some food. For a few minutes, I talked myself through Min y Mor as promised to Gareth, wondering if I would be able to memorize it well enough in the little time I had without messing with my other memorization. Ultimately I let it go, because it didn’t feel right to work on it too much then — I was a bit tired, a bit hungry, and I needed to do something else.

A lovely elderly couple asked (in Welsh, then in English) if the seats next to us were free, and we amiably bade them to sit down. I was by then experimenting with tethering my smartphone’s 3G connection to the tablet, and the results were mixed. We ended up in conversation — in English! — with Gerald and his wife about all manner of things; the Eisteddfod, Welsh heritage, where various groups of settlers had put down roots after going to the States. We talked about the Welsh language quite a bit and, in fact, they praised our diction. Not just mine — Marty’s, too! It was very pleasant, and we left there feeling thrilled with the friendly mojo of all the Welsh (and well-fed, too).

Indeed, I can’t remember an instance where a friendly smile was disregarded; we felt like we could start a conversation with any stranger in Ebbw Vale and thereabouts, and end up with wonderful new friends. In Wales, well… of course.

At the Cymru A’r Byd booth we found Alan Upshall, Bryan Jones and company, standing and talking, waiting for everyone to arrive. The reception, we found out, would be elsewhere — but the plan was to meet at the booth and then trek, all together, to that location. Marty and I smiled and met people and tried to memorize names, since most (including ourselves) were wearing handy-dandy name tags for reference (and probably wouldn’t be later that week).

In the end, our trek ended right back where Marty and I had begun: At the restaurant near the middle of the grounds, to one side of the tent where an area was closed off. Serendipity! I tried not to think too much about the walk we might have saved and the way my shoes were pinching, because we were surrounded by smiling faces and amicable company. Who cared if we had walked awhile? This was the last stop of the day, and it was going to be fantastic.

In fact, it was fantastic. We sat with Alan Upshall, the Baron Roberts of Llandudno and several others who happily joined in conversation. There was a bright, precise young woman playing the harp. Welsh cakes and tea were served at one end of the reception space. Marty and most of the others queue’d up to bring some back to the table, while I waited — no wheat or caffeine for me, I’m afraid, two days before competing! But Marty told me later that while he was in the queue, he had seized on the opportunity to use his hard-practiced Welsh phrase.

For Lord Roberts had walked up to him, clapped him on the shoulder, and began a perfectly normal conversation with him (in Welsh). Marty waited for him to finish the sentence, and then — delighted, I’m sure, to have the chance to give it a shot! — responded with: “Mae’n ddrwg gen i — dwy ddim yn deall.” I’m sorry — I don’t understand.

Lord Roberts responded, Ah! and launched into what must have been a sort of explanation… in Welsh!

This, we decided later, was the real flaw in our plan. We should have taught ourselves to say, “I’m sorry — I don’t speak Welsh.” Uh… right.

Live and learn.

After a moment, Marty explained (in English this time) that he actually didn’t understand Welsh. Oops, ha ha. Lord Roberts paused, perplexed: But just a moment ago, you were saying something in Welsh…? And Marty repeated the phrase. Lord Roberts has a big, friendly laugh and a brilliant sense of humor. They talked for little while after that — in English! — about what Marty did, why he was here (tagging along with me!), and so on. When Marty told me later, the story cracked me right up.

That afternoon there was much Welsh discussion, and many Welsh announcements. I kept my ears open and my brain focused to catch words I knew, which weren’t many. Cymru A’r Byd, Wales International, is an organization dedicated to connecting people of Welsh descent and friends of Wales throughout the world — so a few people spoke in English as well, and it was clear that other languages would also have been welcomed. Lord Roberts is its president, and although I’d heard about the organization fleetingly at other events in the States, this was my first opportunity to truly understand what they were up to. I daresay, it was lovely.

As we got ready to leave and many people were filtering out of the tent, I stopped to meet the harpist. I’d had this mad urge, ever since seeing a booth on the Maes filled with huge, beautiful harps for sale, to ask a harpist to play Dafydd y Gareg Wen with me — off the cuff, randomly, to see what might happen. This harpist’s name was Harriet if I’m remembering it right, and she grinned at me when I asked. “Sure, if you can sing it in this key!” she answered, setting fingertips to strings.

And I did.

There’s nothing like meeting another musician for the first time and making music together. It’s something Gareth had mentioned briefly when we rehearsed earlier that day, enchantedly, delightedly. Harriet’s grin and my own high-flying glee said that this was the same, regardless of how low the key was for me. Who the hell cares about the damn key? Ten or so reception-goers stayed to listen to us, and we laughed and talked and I thanked her for humoring me. Bryan Jones — I believe! — snapped the above picture for an article that sounded like it was headed for the Ninnau, or another Welsh publication. Then Marty and I talked to Alan for a few minutes, determined that we would see him the next day at the preliminary tests… and we headed out.

After all, I had Min y Mor to memorize.

The rest of that evening is a very tired blur. I was energized by my rehearsal with Gareth, but exhausted by all the walking we’d done on the Maes (in pinchy shoes, no less). It had been windy and damp, and walking on rocks is hard! Tuckered out, we decided to eat at the Vine Tree before I changed my mind and went to bed instead. And at the Vine Tree, waiting for our food, I recited Min y Mor.

Again and again and again, a tumble in my brain.

Gwelais long ar y glas li… Yn y gwyll yn ym golli… Draw yr hwyliodd drwy’r heli, a Rhywun hoff arni hi. Over and over and over, until the next table looked at me kind of funny out of the corners of their eyes. I didn’t have a word-by-word translation, but it’s love poetry — it’s beautiful. I turned it into rote mathematics for the purpose of memorization so that later it could truly be poetry. 2×1=1. 2×2=4. 2×3=6. 2×4=8…

The food was delicious, but I wasn’t paying a lot of attention.

I thought, I might be able to do this thing. And the part of me that was still afraid ceded some valuable territory to the part of me that had real respect for what I was attempting… and real hope for my likelihood of succeeding. Marty looked proud, I think.

We finished our food. The lamb at the Vine Tree was incomparably tasty. Enough to (finally) turn off my brain, because I would need the rest. Tomorrow was preliminaries.

We went home, and went to bed.

Ah, now we begin to catch up with ourselves! Once again it’s Wednesday, August 4th… and I have a rehearsal to get to.

We found Gareth as planned at the main entrance — aaaaaall the way at the other end of the Maes. Wrapped up in my tartan, we found him and exchanged warm and delighted pleasantries before setting off for rehearsal space. He was dignified, purposeful, very friendly and clearly well-experienced with the Eisteddfod. When we found the rehearsal space in question, I was entertained — there were two large structures sitting outside behind the Eisteddfod Office, and they looked a hell of a lot like shipping containers. Each contained an upright piano, a table or two, and chairs. Maybe they were more like the little offices that many construction companies have outside, simple and boxy and easily hitched to some vehicle and moved to the next spot. But they were essentially shipping containers, as far as I was concerned — with one or two little windows in each.

So, you know. Rehearsal containers. To contain rehearsals. ;}

Inside, echoes! Marty parked himself in one corner and Gareth and I proceeded to sing through the first song — the Mansel Thomas.

If you haven’t heard my rehearsal rendition of the Mansel Thomas yet, well, it’s really something. It’s a complex song, and it’s difficult to get right the first hundred times. At my very last rehearsal with M___, it sounded like this:

20100723 Last Pianist Reh Set (mistake, kept moving!) by MeganElizabethMorris

With Gareth’s accompaniment that first run, it was fast — but it went well.

“Well done, you,” he said, a phrase that became dear to me. I would thereafter repeat those words to myself, again and again, as a marker of pride and feeling of accomplishment. So often, in fact, that Marty started doing it too. “So,” Gareth paused curiously, thoughtfully… “Are you a singer?”

“Yep!” I chirruped. “I sing!” I was feeling it, too — like I could do this thing, like I was this thing. And then, of course, I realized what he meant:

“As a profession?”

“Well, not exactly…” So I explained to him a situation he has no doubt heard dozens of times, and he obviously understood. Ran out of money, studying intermittently, so on and so forth… seeking to lift up this project and secure it an ongoing, important part of my life and work, Ideaschema’s permanent place as my (I hate saying this) “day job”… all the bits and pieces, and that someday soon music would be a wonderfully normal part of my “day job”, too. I described to him how Joan had been assisting my Welsh by sending me diction recordings. He nodded sagely, and seemed — to my delight — quietly impressed.

“So I imagine it’s coming off okay, huh?” I ventured, because he hadn’t said anything negative about my diction — and I’d heard his Welsh patter several times that day already, as we met other performers coming and going. He spoke Welsh, and he had likely heard many singers already; he ought to know.

“It’s brilliant,” he said, and sounded like he meant it.

My heart leapt three quarters of an inch, and stayed there.

We sang the Carmen. Fiddled with tempos. I finished the end, that hopping high note, and breathed deep. It was going fairly well, I thought.

“Have you prepared for the Blue Ribbon?” he asked slowly, his tone full of gravity and purpose.

I explained that, no… I hadn’t really. I had only just realized — that day, even, talking to Jon — that it wasn’t entirely acceptable to perform one of the original two competition pieces for the David Ellis competition. The David Ellis competition awards the Rhuban Glas — the Blue Ribbon, or the Blue Riband — and it was the David Ellis in which I would (theoretically) compete if I won the mezzo-soprano mainstage competition.

Could this information have been in the Welsh competition rules? Could it have been somewhere else that I hadn’t seen? Was it just common knowledge, among Eisteddfod-goers? I didn’t know. For sure, it may well have been in that second mailing that I hadn’t known I should have received until I got to the Maes that first day. Freaking Atlantic Ocean.

The solid, knowledgeable look on Gareth’s face (and that little sliver of shocked hope I had at this point accumulated in the back of my throat) made me drag out the tablet and bring up Min y Mor, which I hadn’t looked at in… yes… I’m not kidding… a year. Not a note of it. Not since the North American Festival of Wales in Pittsburgh.

We sang through. I was maybe half memorized… ish. I was torn between the stress of adding another song and the sheer, impossible consideration that I could… theoretically… make it to the David Ellis. And I barely wanted to think about it, much less add more to my plate to prepare for it.

But I couldn’t ignore that look on his face. “You have got to be prepared to win,” he said.

And deep down, of course, I knew he was absolutely right. Deep down, I agreed with him. All it had taken was the opinion of someone who a) knew what he was talking about, and b)… seemed to think I had a seriously decent chance.

I had to at least try.

We sang through the other two pieces again. He played quickly — but there was so much personality in his accompaniment. To my ears it was patter, like his Welsh. Well-versed, familiar. Of course, he was accompanying 8 people, all singing the same 2 out of 3 pieces. He was incredibly good. The Mansel Thomas had become very pleasant to my ears — now that I knew what it was supposed to sound like after many rehearsals with M___, now that I knew it and could sing it. The last note of the Carmen rang out, right on key, right in rhythm.

I promised that I would look at Min y Mor and hoped to high heaven I had enough time to make it good before the David Ellis, should-I-be-so-lucky… but better, I could look at it tonight and tomorrow, and then just leave it alone until after the mezzo-soprano competition. That would be best, and I wouldn’t risk sabotaging my other pieces; I’d already rehearsed them near-to-death, anyway.

When we departed, I thanked him profusely, and he thanked me for coming over for the Eisteddfod — and, he added, for learning the pieces. “It’s no easy task,” he said.

Outside the rehearsal container, Marty and I settled our numerous carry-things about our shoulders, and (in a tiny corner of my brain, vibrating with hope and terror) we went on our way.

I was going to call this particular series of posts “Reception, Rehearsal, and the First Tiny Stirrings of An Unnameless and Overwhelming Desire to Make Something Wonderful Happen”.

Then I decided that would be far too long, and would be something of a cop-out in terms of taking responsibility for the real content of the posts. Because if I can’t describe this in an entire blog entry (or three), I have no business trying to cram that kind of a Twitteresque recap into my titles. And you’d end up disappointed anyway, because my whole description would be in the teaser with no substance left for the actual post. Like American Pie. The commercials gave away all the funny bits. Remember that? Man, that pissed me off.

So I won’t do that. Or, I’ll try not to do that and do a lot of laughing about how I nonetheless gave everything away before I’d barely begun. (It would help if I’d had more sleep!)

Breathe, Megan.

Wednesday.

It’s Wednesday the 4th, and this means that for all intents and purposes it’s Go Time. My first (and essentially only) rehearsal with my accompanist, the reception for Cymru A’r Byd, and a trip to the Maes required to actually bear fruit rather than simply be a relaxing reconnaissance and scouting-out. I woke at 8. I washed myself. The shower in our suite at Park Place was glorious, have I mentioned it? It’s really just a pane of glass on one side of the bathtub. It was fascinating and unfamiliar at first, but I came to adore it because it felt like my shower space was actually as big as the whole bathroom (which of course it technically wasn’t).

At any rate…

Wednesday was the day I started having huge breakfasts again. Mine had tapered down over the past handful of days, because I just wasn’t used to eating a whole lot for breakfast. An egg, a rasher of bacon, some fruit and some tea. Today, I had a full traditional breakfast again — huge and wonderful. I knew I’d need the extra fuel, because today was going to be the first of my major Eisteddfod days and I wanted to have plenty of energy to meet it head-on.

We had a lovely time talking with Jon and Caryl and Elgan and his parents. They explained a lot about the Eisteddfod that I hadn’t previously understood, mostly in the vein of a local perspective and the feeling of the event to someone to whom it is a far more familiar experience than it is for me. Marty and I didn’t linger long, though, because we were planned to meet Gareth at 12:30 and we didn’t want to run late.

It was rainy and foggy as Kev drove us over the moors toward Ebbw Vale.

Look at those hills.

When we originally arrived at the Birmingham International Airport, we collected our luggage and went straight to the nearest currency exchange booth. I didn’t really know what I was doing, but I knew that was probably the best place to ask questions and get some local cash in case we needed it. The woman there was a darling, and although she signed me up for something I am not sure was a good idea (a sort of debit card that worked locally and could — theoretically — be refilled via internet for a conversion fee) she was otherwise quite helpful. I wasn’t sure if it was a sales technique or not when she told me that our American plastic might not work everywhere in the UK. But when we arrived at the Maes this Wednesday morning, we had our first major run-in with Swipe Fatigue.

Yes, Swipe Fatigue. Wherein the swipe doesn’t work, and I become fatigued. (And then write about it on the internet.)

It seems that in the UK, most establishments read plastic cards by way of a certain chip. This lets them (somehow) scan the chip, or just insert one end of the card into a little portable processing device that some clerks carry around, rather than a device that stays on the register where customers check out. We saw a variety of different systems while we were there but one thing trended true: The slightly uncertain or confused look we encountered easily 70% of the time when we mentioned that our cards were swipe, not chip.

Don’t get me wrong. Plenty of places had no problem with this — they knew how to swipe the card and they knew how to get it to go through. Most of them hadn’t had to swipe something in ages (if ever) and weren’t entirely sure they knew how, but when they tried what they knew it worked fine and we went along our way. In this case, however, the girls selling tickets at the entrance had no clue what to do to let us pay for our tickets. I don’t blame them, but it was pretty weird after having so easily paid for tickets at the same entrance a few days earlier. Eventually (after a lot of trial and error and phone calls to other Eisteddfod workers) we got it figured out. It was ultimately no problem at all, and we met Gareth just about on time. (Well, pretty close.) But it stuck in my head, this random swipeless moment in our trip, and made me wonder if we can upgrade our cards in some way. I know some credit cards are using chips… but what about regular bank cards?

Something to ask the credit union when we switch banks, I think.

Through the entrance and onto the field, we laughed — because if we’d had Kev drop us at the north entrance, we’d already be there by now. Well, it was okay. It wasn’t raining heavily, though it was a bit windy. I wrapped my tartan around me, and we set off to find a pianist!

On Tuesday August 3rd, I slept all day.

No, really.

I just kept sleeping. I slept and slept and slept! I didn’t sleep straight through breakfast, but I diligently went back to bed after breakfast was finished. I knew I’d need it later, and so I just stayed in bed and read and napped and kept the curtains mostly closed all day.

Sometime in the afternoon, I showered and warmed up slowly, singing each of my pieces three times through and feeling rather good about them. I recorded them, to keep myself focused; I didn’t learn this until recently, that recording pieces that otherwise don’t need to be recorded keeps me paying much better attention to all the bits and pieces, as if I’m performing for someone at that moment after all. (It also lets me share tiny tidbits with you, like this one…)

8 3 10 6 22 PM Clip from rehearsal with piano track by MeganElizabethMorris

Then, I sang Dafydd y Garreg Wen because it had been in my head nonstop the last few days. Another song inspired by green Welsh hills… This has long been one of my favorite Welsh tunes and definitely one of my favorite Bryn Terfel recordings. I can’t offer you a mastered track, but I can offer you the tune sans accompaniment:

8 3 10 6 33 PM Dafydd y Garreg Wen, sans accompaniment by MeganElizabethMorris

A fairly literal translation, from the Dafydd y Garreg Wen Wikipedia entry:

‘Carry’, said David, ‘my harp to me’
I would like, before dying, to give a tune on it (her)
Lift my hands to reach the strings
God bless you, my widow and children!
Last night I heard an angel’s voice like this:
“David, come home and play through the glen!”
Harp of my youth, farewell to your strings!
God bless you, my widow and children!

A half hour before dinner, I showed Marty the wonders of the footpath. It was a glorious walk. The wind blew mist that sprinkled on us as we went.

One of the stones we came across set my brain to tugging, and I thought — but I couldn’t remember for sure — that the first name on my genealogy list was Thomas Lewis. So I snapped the photo, even though Marty and I were deep in conversation most of the way. When I got home, it turned out I had been right, though it seems highly unlikely that this is the same Thomas Lewis (and given the proliferation of those same names throughout Welsh history, I’m sure there were plenty of Thomas Lewises running around). But it was still cool to see one there, who even lived at roughly the same time.

At dinner, Maxine made us sweet and sour chicken, and we invited Owen to sit with us. We had met him (along with Elgan and Elgan’s parents) at breakfast earlier that day when I was still half asleep. Owen and Marty and I were the only three at dinner this evening, so this time we chilled and took the time to chat.

Owen is downright stately, a tall and fit man in his later years with a distinguished and intelligent air. He speaks slowly and of many and varied items of interest — a wealth of theater, poetry, and the finer points of the Welsh language. In initial conversations like this one, I had no idea how fond we would become of these housemates! When you stay at a hotel, you don’t come to feel like family with the other hotel-goers. At this bed and breakfast, though, that’s very near what was happening. This particular share of Park Place patrons became very dear to us over the course of Eisteddfod week. I’m sentimental to a fault, for sure, but it’s still true. I’m just the one willing to dwell on it in public. ;}

I sat with my back to the right-hand wall of the dining room; Marty sat at the end with his back towards the garden doors. Owen sat facing me, and we all ate as we talked. I remember that the food was delicious. Owen had something similar, but vegetarian. We talked about food and the Eisteddfod, and Owen told us how he came to be adjudicating for a folk dancing competition, his teaching of the Welsh language, his travels between home and here, and the vagaries of satellite navigation devices. I remember that Marty and Owen had some kind of dessert, and Maxine made me a bowl of fresh fruit. And I remember that this was the beginning of a series of evenings that week where we stayed in after-dinner conversation far later than planned simply because there was nothing better we could imagine doing with our time, right at that moment. It was glorious!

Come to think of it, I guess I didn’t sleep all day. Not in the strictest sense, at least. ;}

On Monday the 2nd of August, I jailbroke my iPhone 3GS. Because I could. (Also, because it’s legal now. Nice, right?)

I had some shopping to do. I needed eyebrow makeup, as much as eyebrow makeup has never really agreed with me — we determined that for television, I could use it to darken them a bit and it would look just right. And I still needed hose and a good pair of shoes to match my competition dress.

We had discussed shopping in London, until we discovered that London was easily three and a half hours away by train… one way. Then we had discussed shopping in Cardiff (which was our original choice, anyway, before I got hooked on the idea of London). And then we had discovered Festival Park, which was only ten or fifteen minutes away in Ebbw Vale and probably had whatever I needed. That was tempting, because it would be easy.

But we just couldn’t let go of the idea of going to Cardiff. Because honestly, it sounded fun.

Even the hour-long train ride sounded fun.

So Cardiff it was!

At breakfast Monday morning we met Jon and Caryl, who were also in town for the Eisteddfod. That made at least five lovely new friends under the same roof — Maxine and Graham as wonderful proprietors, and Pat being the first of the lot in for the Eisteddfod. Jon was competing in the Eisteddfod, in fact, with his folk choir. We chatted briefly and had breakfast, and Marty and I called Kev to pick us up so that we could make the next train out of Ebbw Vale Parkway.

Marty and I had great fun on the train. Trains in the UK — as far as I can tell — are truly fantastic. How wonderful it would be to have trains like this in the US! Yes, they’re exhausting when you’re carting around loads of luggage — but when it’s a day trip and all you’re carrying around is a purse and maybe a few shopping bags, it’s fantastic. The trains tended towards being clean and respectable, with people generally behaving themselves and quietly chillin’ out as they approached their destination. Marty and I were also generally well-behaved, but since there was nobody else in our car on the way to Cardiff, we had perhaps a bit more fun than we might have otherwise. And we accomplished quite a bit, too, because by the time the ride was over, we could say “I’m sorry, I don’t understand” in Welsh. We could also say “My hovercraft is full of eels.”

This video is proof of our industrious natures and determination to adopt the Welsh language:

When we arrived in Cardiff, we set to our shopping plans. We ate at a great pub (bar? grill? restaurant? eatery?) called The Yard, and we found St. David’s shopping center (Dewi Sant!). The MAC Cosmetics area in the center was staffed by two incredibly friendly and helpful citizens of Cardiff who were — as I have come to expect from MAC employees — insanely patient and awesome about helping me figure out the whole crazy eyebrow pencil thing. I rewarded them by spending money (as I do in such establishments). We found the perfect shoes for my competition dress at a Clarks not too far from there, and hose at Debenhams… and sushi at Zushi, where the entrees floated around the room on tiny boats. Delicious.

And (of course), I took a few pictures.

My iPhone ran out of juice right about the time we headed back, but we were fine; we got some snacks at a little store next to the train station and spent a very relaxing hour on our way back to Ebbw Vale Parkway. I have to say, though: It’s a fascinating experience to be in a strange new place with cell reception, because I can navigate in a way I never could when I used to go abroad before. This has been the first major travel experience where I could use smartphone data heavily to navigate a completely new (and sometimes strange) locale. In the States, we have some continuous frame of reference — but even in another English-speaking country, the cues are different. The frame of reference can quickly become unfamiliar, and people willing to give directions may still assume a certain default foundation of knowledge on the part of the traveler. The smartphone is way more useful than usual in this situation.

After Cardiff, in any case, I do believe we went home and passed out. It was quite a lovely day!

In the end, we accomplished everything we set out for on the Maes that Sunday.

We determined that there was a very decent 3G connection available via iPhone, and that I could tether it to my iPad with a little bit of finagling. (I found out later that some sites, like MailChimp, didn’t like the connection speed much — but it was a hell of a lot better than roaming and I won’t even try to compare it to having no connection at all.)

We stopped by the Cymru A’r Byd booth to meet Bryan Jones of Wales International, so that Marty and I had the right bits and pieces to attend the reception Lord Roberts had mentioned in Pittsburgh.

We stopped by the Eisteddfod Office to meet the truly incomparable Elinor, who had answered my myriad questions via email over the past several months and been, on the whole, incredibly patient and helpful. I was glad to meet her and thank her in person!

I also obtained a phone number for Gareth, my accompanist-to-be, and with all of that settled, I felt pretty great about the beginning of my week. It was a great day, and I’m not ashamed to tell you that I was TOTALLY exhausted by the time we called Kev and headed back to the spot where he promised to pick us up.

We said goodbye to the field (for now!) and Kev drove us back to Park Place. Over the hills, past sheep after sheep after sheep, down into Crickhowell.

Once we were home, we realized that we still needed to wrangle dinner — so Marty walked over to the Vine Tree, just a few doors down from our bed & breakfast. When he returned, he explained to me that they hadn’t had any takeaway boxes, but they’d very kindly offered him their dishes as long as he could bring them back when we were done.

I felt that this was incredibly above and beyond the call of duty, in terms of restaurant takeaway. And considering how tired and hungry I was by then, you can imagine my gratitude!

(Also, the food was insanely delicious.)

(And then we went to bed. AFTER Marty returned the dishes, of course!)

One of our most significant accomplishments on Sunday the 1st was to procure a Welsh cake for Marty.

Welsh cakes — if you’re not familiar with them — are perhaps one of the tastiest treats in the known universe. They’re full of things I can’t eat anymore (wheat, sugar, etc.!) but I admit I took a tiny bite of Marty’s whenever he managed to get his hands on one. The Welsh cakes in Wales are, predictably, even more delicious than the Welsh cakes in America.

Don’t be confused by the look on Marty’s face in this video. That’s his Welsh cakes are badass face.

Let’s mosey on back to August 1st, shall we? This is the very first day we ventured to the Eisteddfod field.

We called Kev and he came for us; it was a beautiful day. For the second time, we went up and over the mountain between us and Ebbw Vale — Kev said that he didn’t know it was a particular mountain, exactly, but that we were going up and over “the moors”. I can’t speak to the views, because I’ll be getting pictures of them later before we leave, and nothing I say about them is going to do them justice. We went high, high up and then back down; the moors are covered in sheep, some of whom don’t know when to stay out of the road! The roads are winding and narrow. They are no doubt treacherous in inclement weather, but today was clear. Through winding roads, up into the mountains, down into Ebbw Vale — and Kev left us near what I believe was the southern entrance to the Eisteddfod field.

Now, the Eisteddfod field is called the Maes, which basically means “field” or “grounds” or “general area” in Welsh and is used all by itself to refer to the grounds where the Eisteddfod is held. It’s pronounced a bit like “mice”. The Maes this year is a north-south strip of space that once belonged to the Ebbw Vale steelworks. Owen told us that it only closed down a handful of years ago, and that Wales has endured something very similar to what we know of Youngstown and the Rust Belt — the local industry closes down, the steel jobs go away. It sounds like many jobs were lost when the Ebbw Vale Steelworks closed down, as well.

From Mynedfa 2 — the second entrance — we walked up towards the field.

On either side of us, walking north, rose the same tall green hills we’d been seeing everywhere. As we came through the gate where our tickets were checked, we could see great old buildings to our left. Part of the old steelworks, I imagine?

We wandered forward, taking it all in. There was a circle of stones on our left, Stonehenge-like. (I found out later that the druids meet there at every Eisteddfod, although this year there was too much rain for them to meet outside.) We found a large eating area towards the right as we continued, and since we hadn’t had lunch yet, that’s where we stopped for awhile. There was a huge shade structure over a number of picnic tables with a crowd of other people talking and eating and listening to the music nearby.

8 1 10 2 43 PM Eisteddfod bagpipe crowd sounds by MeganElizabethMorris

After we ate, we wandered further into the Eisteddfod. There were booths and stands of every kind — organizations from Ebbw Vale and Blaenau Gwent and all across Wales, vendors and crafters, radio stations, booksellers, rallying causes and playing music and teaching things to children, selling instruments and clothing and jewelry. There was everything we could imagine, with the sole exception of Penderyn Distillery — which we were sad to see absent. (We went to tour the distillery later that week, though, so it wasn’t all bad!)

Towards the north end of the Maes, we found the Main Pavilion — Pafiliwn, of course. On it were loudspeakers, and they were broadcasting the sounds of the mainstage from inside. Below the photograph is a clip of what we heard, lingering near…

8 1 10 3 00 PM A choir being broadcast from inside pafiliwn pinc by MeganElizabethMorris

I thought, dude. If I make it through preliminaries, it won’t just be people in the audience who hear me, or the people in front of their televisions or listening to radios… it will be everyone on the field, as well. That thrilled me, and a big question mark floated over my head, because who knew if I’d make it through preliminaries? There was no guarantee of anything. I’d have to wait… and see.

We continued through and found another band to listen to for a few minutes. There were so many! There were folk-music bands, and contemporary rock bands, and of course cross-dressing shiny silver tights-wearing bands like this one! It was fantastic.

It was endless and fascinating. And we still had errands to run before heading home!

Well, it’s done! And I’m still in a haze, that’s for sure, but I know it went well. Angharad was gorgeous and sang beautifully, and she’s going on to the David Ellis. I’m no precise judge of Welsh diction or singing technique, but to me she sounded perfect — and it was a pleasure to share the stage with her.

She mentioned something afterward that I am grateful for as well: Not all competitions have competitors who are so friendly and warm with one another, so we feel quite lucky when that’s the case. (After I finish this post, I daresay I’ll go find her on Facebook). ;}

I barely remember being on stage, but I do remember that I wasn’t particularly nervous. I was certainly nervous in the preliminaries, but I felt very solid in the pavilion. I remembered how many of you woke up in the painfully early morning hours to watch me, and I felt good and loved and happy!

Angharad and I were pulled to a studio just off the gathering area, and they sat us on a pretty green couch and put little black mics on us and quizzed us about our experience. The host’s name was Sarah, I think, and I’m not sure what the station was, but they were all very friendly.

At 3pm BST, I’ll be talking again to Roy Noble — so see if you can find the live web radio feed for BBC Radio Wales, that’s where I’ll be! (If I can manage to find the link on the tablet, I’ll edit and add it here.)

Since we still have a few hours to wait until then, I’ve sent Marty off to scout out a few things I want to pick up while we’re here, and I’m sitting in that same gathering area with the long red couches and mobs and mobs of people, and video cameras, and so on! I’ll send a note to the list, as well, so that everyone is in the loop.

Those of you who found this site because it was mentioned on the mainstage — Croeso! Thank you for finding me!

Those of you who have been following this from the beginning: You really fueled me, there’s no doubt about it. It’s a glorious experience to be able to share. I’m so grateful for you all!

Short update, because I can’t load MailChimp on this connection and I need to get to bed:

I’m through preliminaries. Only two were advanced, myself and another mezzo who I haven’t come across before. She’s very, VERY good. I sing tomorrow on the big mainstage at 11:35am BST. There is a LIVE video feed that you can watch, right here –

National Eisteddfod @ BBC Wales (live video)

I will also be talking to Roy Noble on BBC Radio Wales tomorrow afternoon, after I compete, and, I think, after I know the results. I’ll get you a time on that as soon as I can!

For now, bed. And all of you who cheered me on via Twitter before and after I sang prelims… My god. You are so wonderful. You are making this experience amazing!!