Bartamaha (Cardiff):- For the last 10 years, every other Saturday he’s been charged with entertaining around 20,000 fans in his role as Cardiff City’s stadium announcer.
But despite his public speaking experience, Ali Yassine admits that he’s scared, as he prepares to read extracts from his Welsh-language autobiography, Llais yr Adar Gleision (Bluebirds’ Voice), for commuters on the Arriva Trains Wales service from Merthyr to Cardiff Central on Tuesday.
He said: “I’ve got to stand there like a mad man, reading out loud, to people who probably don’t speak Welsh, and almost certainly aren’t in the mood to hear about me!
“Apart from that I’m really looking forward to it. And if even one or two people pick up the book for themselves, then it will have been worth the effort.”
It’s all in aid of the Welsh Assembly Government’s Quick Read Week, which aims to get the public more engaged with literature.
Quick Read has commissioned eight short books – four English, four Welsh – all under 100 pages and £2, designed specifically to be just the right length for a journey to work or flick-through before bedtime.

For Ali, who comes from Somali and Egyptian heritage, and moved to Cardiff as a youngster, the key to getting more people reading is to write about something which they are interested in.
“When they first asked me to put something together for the Quick Read project, my first thought was that I was honoured, then reality sunk in, and my second thought was ‘What the hell am I going to say in this book?’”
“But the answer’s simple really, write about what you know, what you’re passionate about, and what people are interested in.
“A lot of people love football, and almost everyone loves having a nose at someone else’s life, so I thought that I’d tell them about my experiences behind the mic at Cardiff City, the good times and the scrapes, and how I got to be there in the first place.”
According to Ali, Quick Read, now in its fifth year, has succeeded where similar projects failed, by commissioning stories tailor-made for the shorter format, rather than attempting to summarise longer works.
“Especially in Welsh, we’ve got to get people, not only reading the language, but enjoying reading the language,” he said.
“We’re all so busy these days, that the challenge was to offer up books which left the readers coming away with the sense that they’d enjoyed a complete product in the time which they had available.”
“If you try to précis a longer book, people can tell that they’re being short changed, and won’t come back to reading in the future.”
Other events in Quick Read Week include the launch of a library carriage on Arriva’s early morning south-to-north Wales service, the free distribution of the eight books among passengers on Highland Airway’s Cardiff to Anglesey flights, and a personal reading and workshop by Valleys author Rachel Trezise for prisoners at Cardiff jail.
Leighton Andrews, the assembly government’s education minister said: “The library carriage is a great idea, helping those who can’t always find the time to read to bury their heads in a good book.
“The ever-increasing range of titles available through the Quick Reads scheme is good to see.
“Anything which encourages people to pick up a good book and develop their literacy skills should be highly commended.”

By Neil Prior
BBC Wales

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