One thing that strikes most British or American visitors to Italy is how in forma (well-toned) the Italians are. Whether this is down to the famous Mediterranean diet or the fact that most Italians put in several hours at la palestra (the gym) each week is unclear, but if you walk the streets of Milan [...]
The impersonal ‘you’ is used in English when not directly referring to the person or people in front of you, but people in general - eg ‘How do you get to the centre?’ or ‘You buy bread at the baker’s’.
In Italian ‘you’ express this idea using the pronoun ’si’ and the third person singular form [...]
Italians are just as mad about oroscopi (horoscopes) as everyone else. Here are the segni zodiacali (star signs) in Italian:
I giorni della merla (literally, the days of the blackbird) refer to the last three days of January (29th - 31st) which are said to be i piu freddi (the coldest) of l’inverno (the winter).
This expression comes complete with una legenda, passed down from nonni (grandparents) to nipotini (grandkids), explaining both why these days are [...]
I giorni della settimana (the days of the week) consist of lunedì (Monday), martedì (Tuesday), mercoledì (Wednesday), giovedì (Thursday) and venerdì (Friday).
Where do these names derive from? lunedì is from la luna (moon), martedì from il pianeta Marte (the planet Mars), mercoledì from Mercurio (Mercury), giovedì from Giove (Jupiter), and venerdìfrom Venere (Venus). The suffix [...]
Here are some basic verbs and examples on how to use them in a simple sentence:
Click here for grammar rules
To pronounce combinations of vowels (dipthongs) in Italian, just add together the two distinct individual sounds.
The sounds don’t vary like they do in English.
Let’s try some common examples:
ai is pronounced like the english word eye (e.g. mai - never)
au is pronounced like the long sound ow in cow (e.g. autobus - bus)
ea is pronounced like [...]
‘Can’ seems a very simple word in English, but it actually has a number of different meanings which are expressed differently in Italian:
Permission:
use the verb potere
posso aprire la finestra? (can I open the window?)
lei non puo’ venire (she can’t come)
loro possono arrivare alle 8 (they can arrive at 8pm)
Ability
use the verb sapere (to [...]
The last of the twelve days of Christmas, Epifania (Epiphany) is important to Christians as it celebrates the arrival of i Re Magi (three kings or wise men) to see the baby Jesus. In Italy, an important messa (mass) is celebrated on this day (January 6th), with plenty of canzoni (songs) and wise men costumes [...]
From the news, 30/12/2008 - only in Italy!
Indaffarati a fare la spesa, a volte i clienti dei supermercati non hanno tempo di andare in chiesa.
Così un centro commerciale di Tremestieri, nel Messinese, ha deciso di realizzare una cappella all’interno dell’ipermercato, in modo da permettere ai clienti di avere uno spazio dove raccogliersi in preghiera tra [...]
