After saying the word ten times I realised I was fighting a losing battle. I was sitting in the back of a taxi at Cardiff station and I could not get the driver to understand where I wanted to go to. This was distressing because, so far as my family has been able to make out, the Kites originate from Wales. We like to think we were Welsh falconers, back in the day.
I’ve always loved Wales, and fondly remember summer trips to Ruthin Castle, my father stopping the car on windswept hilltops so I could feed the rain-drenched sheep. I haven’t been for ages but I keep my hand in: I watch Gavin and Stacey.
But here I was in a cab in Cardiff saying a word on a piece of paper over and over to no effect. ‘Swalec. I want to go to the Swalec stadium.’ The driver was of Pakistani origin and naively I thought it might be him, not me. So I showed him the piece of paper and he said, ‘Ah! Swalec!’ I can’t convey how he pronounced it. I didn’t commit it to memory because I thought it might be a Pakistani–Welsh rendering and I didn’t want to get confused.
He was only just driving away after he had dropped me when I realised that the event that I had come for didn’t start until the next morning. So I got straight back on the phone to the cab company. ‘Can you pick me up from the Swalec stadium?’ I said. ‘The where?’ And it started again. This time it was worse because I couldn’t show him the piece of paper.
I said Swalleck. Then I tried Swarleck. Then Swayleck. Nothing. I racked my brains. What other pronunciations could there be?
‘Swarrrleeek,’ I said.
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