learn the Italian language with Italian culture

Sai?
la gente è strana
Prima si odia e
poi si ama
Cambia idea
improvvisamente
Prima la verità poi
Mentirà lui
Senza serietà
come fosse niente.
Sai
la gente è matta
Forse troppo insoddisfatta
Segue il mondo ciecamente
Quando la moda cambia
Lei pure cambia
Continuamente
scioccamente
Tu, tu che sei diverso
Almeno tu nell’universo
Un punto sei
che non ruota mai
Intorno a me
Un sole che splende
per me soltanto
Come un diamante
in mezzo al cuore, tu..
Sai
la gente [...]

Definite article: ‘the’
The first thing to know is that the Italian language uses definite articles a lot more than in English when speaking generally. For example, where we would say beautiful women, Italians would say le belle donne (the beautiful women) or il cibo italiano instead of italian food
Next we should remember that articles have [...]

Although a fair number of railway employees know a small amount of English these days, you may find yourself needing to do the job in Italian…
Buongiorno, a che ora parte il prossimo treno per (Torino)?
Che tipo di treno vuole prendere? Un intercity o regionale?
L’intercity
Parte fra (dieci) minuti, binario (due)
Posso avere un biglietto?
Certo, solo andata o [...]

Italian vowels are easy to pronounce because, unlike in English, they always stay the same!
Let’s try:
a is pronounced like the a of apple (e.g. banana - bahnahnah not buhnaaahnuh)
e is pronounced like the e of egg (e.g. belle donne - belleh donneh)
i is a little more complicated! It’s midway between the i of it and [...]

Everyone knows that Italians are a sociable lot. One of the ways in which this manifests itself is in the way they construct their abitazione (housing). Where other nationalities tend to give themselves a bit of space, Italians like to abitare (live), literally, on top of each other.The condominio (block of flats) is probably the [...]

For all opera lovers - here’s what Luciano’s singing:
Nessun dorma!
Nessun dorma!
Tu pure, o, Principessa,
nella tua fredda stanza,
guardi le stelle
che fremono d’amore
e di speranza.
Ma il mio mistero e chiuso in me,
il nome mio nessun sapra!
No, no, sulla tua bocca lo diro
quando la luce splendera!
Ed il mio bacio sciogliera il silenzio
che ti fa mia!
(Il nome suo nessun [...]

When learning any language there will always be moments when you want to give up, throw your text book in the bin, punch your teacher and go and take up karate instead. This usually happens after the initial excitement has worn off and you start to realise that it’s not quite as simple as they [...]

The continuous form is used to express an action in progress at a specified time, either in the past, present and future. Examples in English are:
When the phone rang I was watching the TV
At the moment I’m having dinner
This time tomorrow I’ll be sitting on the train.
Italian works more or less in exactly the same [...]

The verb andare (to go) is probably one of the most common you will use when speaking. It is an irregular verb, but it is definitely worth learning how to conjugate it in different tenses:
Present simple:  (io) vado, (tu) vai, (lui/lei) va, (noi) andiamo, (voi) andate, (loro) vanno
Present continuous: verb stare + andando, eg sto [...]

The English, it is said, love to talk about il meteo (the weather). The Italians, on the other hand, really ought to make more use of this topic of conversation since in Italy the weather is incredibly varied. Where English weather is rather mite (mild), the Italian clima (climate) can go from extreme to extreme.
L’autunno [...]