Archive for 'Italian Language'
Italian Fruit and Vegetable Proverbs and Sayings Posted by Serena on Jun 12, 2014
They say that an apple a day keeps the doctor away. Well, true or not we have exactly the same expression in Italian: una mela al giorno leva il medico di torno. However, perhaps because of our national passion for food, we have many more proverbs and idiomatic expressions involving fruit and vegetables. Let’s have…
Indifferentemente Posted by Geoff on Jun 9, 2014
Hand in hand, a couple watch the moon setting. Their love affair is over, there’s nothing left to say. The man waits for his lover to confirm his fears. “Do what you want with me, I know that I mean nothing to you anymore” he says, and begs her “give me that poison … if…
A Sleeping Sloth Posted by Serena on Jun 5, 2014
oggi ho l’energia di un bradipo a riposo (today I’ve got the energy of a sleeping sloth). These were the opening words of a short post on my friend Annalisa’s Facebook yesterday evening. Intrigued by this metaphor, I carried on reading, and … the rest of the post was so beautiful and sad that I…
Eating Out In Italy – With Special Dietary Requirements Posted by Serena on May 27, 2014
A few days ago it was my father’s birthday, and we decided to celebrate by taking him out for a meal. Now, out of the six of us who went to the restaurant, only one didn’t have any specific dietary requirement: mia madre! Here’s a brief account in Italian of the rather complicated process of…
How to Write a Hotel Booking Letter in Italian Posted by Serena on Apr 14, 2014
Thinking about taking a well deserved holiday in Italy? Perhaps it’s time to start booking that hotel. Last week we looked at how to structure a formal letter in Italian, so let’s expand on that by concentrating on the corpo (content) of a hotel booking letter. The sample letter below contains a range of questions…
How to Write a Formal Letter in Italian Posted by Serena on Apr 11, 2014
Writing a formal letter is never an easy task unless you’re a trained professional, and it’s even more difficult of course if you have to do it in Italian. In a formal letter it’s important to use the correct opening and closing formulas, and to use the appropriate formal language. Here’s a formulary that you…
A Chat with Cocò the Cat Posted by Serena on Apr 7, 2014
Ciao … sono Cocò! Serena: “Buongiorno Cocò, come stai? dormito bene?” “Good morning Cocò, how are you? Did you sleep well?” Cocò: “…giorno, uffa! Dove sono i miei croccantini?” “…morning, humph! Where are my biscuits?” Serena: “Sempre molto gentile, eh? Pensare che da piccolino eri così allegro e chiacchierone. La mattina venivi sempre a salutarmi…