A show of true Celtic solidarity !
Support given for Breton Language Schools
I wish to thank all from Cornwall who sponsored the recent relay race (Ar Redadeg) round Brittany in aid of the Diwan (Breton speaking) schools. There were six hundred laps from Nantes to Carhaix, and every runner was sponsored for about £75. Sponsors included many councils and businesses, the Diwan schools, some European minority groups like the Basques, some Celtic Groups like the Breton/Welsh Group but also Cornwall. Two runners were sponsored with Cornish money, Riwana and Talwyn Trevenen Baudu who are half Breton and half Cornish. They ran wearing Cornish T shirts and carrying Cornish flags. It was moving to see Breton and Cornish flags together when the race crossed over the bridge at Plougastel.
A large amount of money was raised in Cornwall so the surplus was given to Lise Diwan at Carhaix. This is the only post-15 lycee for Breton-speaking students. The balance was presented at a public concert in Le Relecq Kerhuon, Brest, by myself, to one of the teachers in the lycee, with a Cornish greeting, translated into Breton by my grand-daughter. The total raised altogether was 1050 euros, a staggering amount.
Thank you to all who contributed, whether family, friends, bards or organisations, and in particular, Gorseth Kernow, the Celtic League and the Cornish branch of the Celtic Congress. The donations provided strong evidence of Celtic solidarity and support for another Celtic culture and language. It has made Cornwall many friends.
I hope that when the standard written form of Cornish is fully implemented, something as inspiring as this race over a long distance could be emulated by us in Cornwall to raise funds for the Cornish language. The organisation was huge but the goodwill towards the Breton language was evident among the whole population. Well done Kernow for supporting so generously such an imaginative enterprise. Thank you.
Ann Trevenen Jenkin, Past Grand Bard, Life President of the Celtic Congress. Fundraiser in Kernow.
( Ann Trevenen Jenkin, An Gernyk, Fordh an Chapel, Leedstown, Hayle TR27 6BA. tel: 01736-850332.for further information or interviews, photographs etc.)
If you look a the website for Ar redadeg you can find hundreds of photos of the race. Go onto the site and choose fotoiou at the top. Talwyn and Riwana were running on the Daoulas-Montroulez bit, and there are lots of photos.Talwyn's are numbers 0263, 0264 and 0267; Riwana's are on page 4. 0287, 0288, 0289 and 0291. There are a few others where you can see the big Cornish flag. I also have some photos myself.)
Showing posts with label Breizh. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Breizh. Show all posts
Thursday, 15 May 2008
Saturday, 10 May 2008
Celtic Breton Activists fight back
Fears of unrest in Brittany after English-owned homes attacked
English expatriates in Brittany have been targeted in a series of attacks against foreign-owned property.
Darren and Linsey Widd, who moved to France after serving with the Army in Iraq, were one of three families affected on the same night.
The attacks have raised fears of a new wave of unrest in Brittany, where houses prices have risen dramatically in some areas after an influx of foreign residents and Parisian second-home owners.
Two years ago locals from the town of Bourbriac staged a demonstration during which they burnt estate agents’ leaflets and chanted “Brittany for the Bretons”. Graffiti calling for “English out” has appeared in towns around the area.
The Widds fled their home in Callac at 2am, with their two-year-old daughter, Chloe, after they awoke to find diesel fumes pouring into their bedroom. The windows of the couple’s café bar, on the ground floor of their terraced property, were on fire and flames were moving up the walls of the house after their car, parked directly outside, was set on fire.
That night two English-owned homes in the neighbouring hamlet of La Chappelle Neuve were broken into and ransacked. A camper van parked outside one of the houses was also burnt out. Nobody was in the houses.
Mr Widd, 32, told The Times that the couple, who moved to Callac a year ago because they could not afford a house in Britain, had considered moving away from France because of fears about further attacks.
“We are not cowardly people – we have spent time in war zones – but when there are children involved it is different. If it hadn’t been for our neighbours’ support we might have packed up and gone home. Yes, we are insured, but that doesn’t comfort you when you are trying to sleep.”
Mr Widd, originally from Scarborough, North Yorkshire, described how he awoke to see flames rising up the outside of the house and had dashed outside carrying his young daughter before attempting to tackle the blaze.
A rag soaked in petrol had apparently been stuffed into the Renault Espace’s fuel tank before being set alight.
“The handbrake cable on the car snapped and the car rolled down the road in flames, before crashing into a parked car and setting fire to two other houses at the bottom of the hill.
“It was like a firebomb rolling down the road. Luckily they had shutters over the doors and windows, but they were burnt along with the brickwork.”
Like the houses and van in La Neuve Chappelle, the Widds’ car was pelted with eggs before the fire. Mrs Widd, 23, originally from Kidderminster, who along with her husband served in Iraq in 2003, said: “Apparently throwing eggs at cars or houses in France is a way of showing disgust at their owners. What shocked us was that there was no warning”.
Lieutenant Michel Cordon, the senior policeman in Callac, said that the latest three incidents were being investigated: “We are doing all we can to find the perpetrators,” he said.
“I can’t say that it was definitely racist. What we do know is that there are incidents of this kind every now and then and we qualify them as ‘acts of incivility’.
“The victims are not only British. Your compatriots can rest assured that everything is being done.”
— About 300,000 Britons own a property in France
— The figure has doubled in five years
— 80 per cent of property purchased is in rural areas and most require renovation.
— After the French, Britons are the second-most-active buyers of property in Paris.
— Two bedroom apartments in the capital start at about €375,000 (£254,031).
— Waterfront properties in Cannes can be bought for about €330,000
— The usual term for a mortgage is 15 years unlike the usual 25-year term in England.
May we offer our sincere congratulations to the brave Breton Patriots who took part in this active service operation ! You are an inspiration to all the oppressed Celtic peoples !
English expatriates in Brittany have been targeted in a series of attacks against foreign-owned property.
Darren and Linsey Widd, who moved to France after serving with the Army in Iraq, were one of three families affected on the same night.
The attacks have raised fears of a new wave of unrest in Brittany, where houses prices have risen dramatically in some areas after an influx of foreign residents and Parisian second-home owners.
Two years ago locals from the town of Bourbriac staged a demonstration during which they burnt estate agents’ leaflets and chanted “Brittany for the Bretons”. Graffiti calling for “English out” has appeared in towns around the area.
The Widds fled their home in Callac at 2am, with their two-year-old daughter, Chloe, after they awoke to find diesel fumes pouring into their bedroom. The windows of the couple’s café bar, on the ground floor of their terraced property, were on fire and flames were moving up the walls of the house after their car, parked directly outside, was set on fire.
That night two English-owned homes in the neighbouring hamlet of La Chappelle Neuve were broken into and ransacked. A camper van parked outside one of the houses was also burnt out. Nobody was in the houses.
Mr Widd, 32, told The Times that the couple, who moved to Callac a year ago because they could not afford a house in Britain, had considered moving away from France because of fears about further attacks.
“We are not cowardly people – we have spent time in war zones – but when there are children involved it is different. If it hadn’t been for our neighbours’ support we might have packed up and gone home. Yes, we are insured, but that doesn’t comfort you when you are trying to sleep.”
Mr Widd, originally from Scarborough, North Yorkshire, described how he awoke to see flames rising up the outside of the house and had dashed outside carrying his young daughter before attempting to tackle the blaze.
A rag soaked in petrol had apparently been stuffed into the Renault Espace’s fuel tank before being set alight.
“The handbrake cable on the car snapped and the car rolled down the road in flames, before crashing into a parked car and setting fire to two other houses at the bottom of the hill.
“It was like a firebomb rolling down the road. Luckily they had shutters over the doors and windows, but they were burnt along with the brickwork.”
Like the houses and van in La Neuve Chappelle, the Widds’ car was pelted with eggs before the fire. Mrs Widd, 23, originally from Kidderminster, who along with her husband served in Iraq in 2003, said: “Apparently throwing eggs at cars or houses in France is a way of showing disgust at their owners. What shocked us was that there was no warning”.
Lieutenant Michel Cordon, the senior policeman in Callac, said that the latest three incidents were being investigated: “We are doing all we can to find the perpetrators,” he said.
“I can’t say that it was definitely racist. What we do know is that there are incidents of this kind every now and then and we qualify them as ‘acts of incivility’.
“The victims are not only British. Your compatriots can rest assured that everything is being done.”
— About 300,000 Britons own a property in France
— The figure has doubled in five years
— 80 per cent of property purchased is in rural areas and most require renovation.
— After the French, Britons are the second-most-active buyers of property in Paris.
— Two bedroom apartments in the capital start at about €375,000 (£254,031).
— Waterfront properties in Cannes can be bought for about €330,000
— The usual term for a mortgage is 15 years unlike the usual 25-year term in England.
May we offer our sincere congratulations to the brave Breton Patriots who took part in this active service operation ! You are an inspiration to all the oppressed Celtic peoples !
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