Archive for December, 2016
Uno Su Due – English Translation Posted by Geoff on Dec 30, 2016
Here, as promised, is the full English translation of yesterday’s blog Uno Su Due. Stefano: Ciao Geoff! Cosa stai facendo? Geoff: Ciao Stefano! Sto ricostruendo questo muro a secco pericolante … infatti ne è già crollato un pezzo più di un anno fa, ma finora non ho avuto l’opportunità di metterlo a posto. Ora è…
Uno Su Due Posted by Geoff on Dec 29, 2016
According to my mother, when I was about 2 years old I used to turn my jigsaw puzzles upside down so that I couldn’t see the pictures, and then assemble them by shape alone. Well, it’s been years since I’ve done a jigsaw puzzle, but I still get immense satisfaction from real world problem solving…
A Mysterious Christmas Present Posted by Serena on Dec 27, 2016
Some Christmas presents are more memorable than others. My first memorable one was given to me when I was about four years old. La mattina di Natale mi svegliai e non trovai nessuno nelle camere da letto, né i miei fratelli né i miei genitori. Allora andai in sala dove c’era l’albero di Natale e…
Astro Del Ciel Posted by Geoff on Dec 23, 2016
Astro Del Ciel (Star from The Sky) is the Italian version of Steven Spielberg’s famous Sci-fi film ‘Close Encounters Of The Third Kind’ … CUT … CUT! Astro Del Ciel, take 2: Astro Del Ciel (Star from The Sky) is the Italian version of the famous Austrian Christmas carol ‘Stille Nacht’ (‘Silent Night’) composed by…
Capitone Fritto Posted by Serena on Dec 22, 2016
In Southern Italy the most traditional dish eaten for il cenone di Natale (Christmas eve meal) is il capitone fritto (fried eel). Despite the masculine name, il capitone is actually a fully mature female eel, which is much bigger than the male. The name capitone comes from the word ‘capa‘ (capo in Italian), meaning ‘head’…
Italian Demonstrative Adjectives – Quello Posted by Serena on Dec 20, 2016
In today’s exercise, we’re going to focus on the aggettivo dimostrativo ‘quello’ (demonstrative adjective ‘that’/’those’). As with the preposizioni articolate (see links below), the Italian aggettivo dimostrativo models its ending on the definite articles il, lo, la, i, gli, and le (the). Let’s begin by looking at how demonstrative adjective correspond to definite articles. Then you…
Does Size Matter In Italy? Posted by Geoff on Dec 16, 2016
Well it certainly does if you don’t know the vocabulary! In today’s blog I’m going to focus on talking about size in Italian, and putting size related vocabulary into useful everyday contexts. La Misura/La Dimensione = Size/Dimension grande plural grandi = great, big, large, tall (n.b. più grande can also mean ‘older’) quanto è grande…