Learn all about the history of the two types of Italian fiere
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| INTRODUCTION |
| Cinzia: Buon giorno a tutti! Mi chiamo Cinzia. |
| Marco: Marco here. Newbie Series, Season 1, lesson #24 - I Have Been Lucky in Italy! Buon giorno a tutti! I’m Marco, and we’d like to welcome you to the 24th lesson of the Newbie Series in Italianpod101.com |
| Cinzia: Benvenuti! |
| Marco: We will be guiding you through basic grammar and vocabulary… |
| Cinzia: And don’t forget that we’re going to discuss different aspects of the language, culture and customs that you’ll find in Italy. |
| Marco: The focus of this lesson is the Italian passato prossimo tense. |
| Cinzia: This conversation takes place at Martina and Laura’s place. |
| Marco: And it is between Paolo and Laura. |
| Cinzia: The speakers are friends, therefore they will be speaking informal Italian. |
| Marco: Today is lesson 24, so let's say it’s the end of a short cycle. From this lesson on, we’ll be seeing the vocabulary just as it appears in dictionary entries, that means only the singular masculine form of the adjective, and singular forms of the nouns we encounter. |
| Cinzia: The verbs will not change as we have always seen the infinitive form. |
| Marco: Yes, and furthermore, in the verb conjugations we’ll be using he/she/it in the English conjugation. |
| Cinzia: And now let's get on with the lesson. |
| Marco: Be sure to check out the PDF for this lesson. |
| DIALOGUE |
| Paolo: È stato un bel concerto? |
| Laura: Meraviglioso. Ho trovato un posto in prima fila. |
| Paolo: Davvero? Hai avuto fortuna! |
| Laura: Ahah, certo! Io sono fortunata! |
| Marco: Let’s hear it slowly now. |
| Paolo: È stato un bel concerto? |
| Laura: Meraviglioso. Ho trovato un posto in prima fila. |
| Paolo: Davvero? Hai avuto fortuna! |
| Laura: Ahah, certo! Io sono fortunata! |
| Marco: And now, with the translation. |
| Paolo: È stato un bel concerto? |
| Marco: Was it a good concert? |
| Laura: Meraviglioso. Ho trovato un posto in prima fila. |
| Marco: It was marvelous. I found a place in the front row. |
| Paolo: Davvero? Hai avuto fortuna! |
| Marco: Really? You were lucky! |
| Laura: Ahah, certo! Io sono fortunata! |
| Marco: Aha, certainly. I am lucky! |
| POST CONVERSATION BANTER |
| Marco: So this is a pretty straightforward dialog, isn't it? |
| Cinzia: Yes, it's actually very easy, but we have something interesting to notice in this dialog Marco... |
| Marco: You mean in the last two lines? |
| Cinzia: Bravo! |
| Marco: So what happens here? |
| Cinzia: In the Italian dialog we have the phrase, Hai avuto fortuna! |
| Marco: Yes! Paolo's phrase. |
| Cinzia: And it literally means "You had luck". |
| Marco: Ok, so the verb would be avere, “to have”. |
| Cinzia: Exactly, but in the English translation we just had the phrase |
| Marco: Because it's more common in English to use “to be lucky” than “to have luck”. |
| Cinzia: Yes, please dear listeners, remember that in Italian we can use both avere and essere in these cases, so we can say avere fortuna, “to have luck”, essere fortunato, “to be lucky”. |
| Marco: Maybe the real change here is in the point of view, in one case you have luck, in the other you are lucky. |
| Cinzia: Actually in Italian we don't really make any differences in the usages, you know. |
| Marco: Ok, let's move on with the vocabulary! |
| VOCAB LIST |
| Marco: First word. |
| Cinzia: bel [natural native speed] |
| Marco: good, pretty, nice |
| Cinzia: bel [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Cinzia: bel [natural native speed] |
| Marco: Next word |
| Cinzia: concerto [natural native speed] |
| Marco: concert |
| Cinzia: concerto [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Cinzia: concerto [natural native speed] |
| Marco: Next word |
| Cinzia: meraviglioso [natural native speed] |
| Marco: marvelous, wonderful |
| Cinzia: meraviglioso [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Cinzia: meraviglioso [natural native speed] |
| Marco: Next word |
| Cinzia: trovare [natural native speed] |
| Marco: to find |
| Cinzia: trovare [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Cinzia: trovare [natural native speed] |
| Marco: Next word |
| Cinzia: posto [natural native speed] |
| Marco: place |
| Cinzia: posto [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Cinzia: posto [natural native speed] |
| Marco: Next word |
| Cinzia: primo [natural native speed] |
| Marco: first |
| Cinzia: primo [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Cinzia: primo [natural native speed] |
| Marco: Next word |
| Cinzia: fila [natural native speed] |
| Marco: row, queue, line |
| Cinzia: fila [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Cinzia: fila [natural native speed] |
| Marco: Next word |
| Cinzia: avere fortuna [natural native speed] |
| Marco: to be lucky, to have luck |
| Cinzia: avere fortuna [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Cinzia: avere fortuna [natural native speed] |
| VOCAB AND PHRASE USAGE |
| Cinzia: And now let’s have a look at the usage for some of the words and expressions. The first word we will look at is concerto. |
| Marco: And the first example is? |
| Cinzia: Vado al concerto jazz. |
| Marco: I'm going to the jazz concert. |
| Cinzia: And the next word we’ll see is meraviglioso. |
| Marco: And the sample sentence is? |
| Cinzia: Lei ha visitato un castello meraviglioso. |
| Marco: She visited a marvelous castle. |
| Cinzia: The next word is posto. |
| Marco: And the sample sentence is? |
| Cinzia: L’Italia è un bel posto per vivere. |
| Marco: Italy is a good place to live. |
| Cinzia: And it's true, isn't it? |
| Marco: Yes, it is, oh my stomach is so full now... Italian food! |
| Cinzia: Oh, ok... Did you eat pizza today? |
| Marco: No, I didn't, let's move on... |
| Cinzia: I know... You ate gnocchi! |
| Marco: Let's move on! |
| Cinzia: Ok, ok… The next word is fila. |
| Marco: And the sample sentence is? |
| Cinzia: Ho prenotato un posto in terza fila. |
| Marco: I booked a place in the third row. |
| Cinzia: And lastly, we have an expression, which is avere fortuna. |
| Marco: And the sample sentence is? |
| Cinzia: Non hai mai avuto fortuna, Marco. |
| Marco: You have never been lucky, Marco. And we can also say, non hai mai avuto fortuna con i ragazzi, Cinzia. |
| Cinzia: Noooo!! |
| Marco: You have never had luck with boys, Cinzia! |
| Cinzia: Oh my god! This is so true! |
| Marco: Let's move on with the grammar point! |
| Cinzia: With the grammar boys? |
| Marco: Point! |
| Cinzia:Ok, let’s move on. |
Lesson focus |
|---|
| Marco: Oh, today we have a pretty big topic, don't we? |
| Cinzia: Yes, we're going to take a look at passato prossimo. |
| Marco: Passato prossimo is a compound tense, it is realized by using the present form of the auxiliary verb, conjugated according to the person they refer to, then followed by the past participle of the main verb. So for today, let's take a look at essere and avere verbs and the respective passato prossimo. |
| Cinzia: Let's take a look at passato prossimo of the verb “to be” essere. |
| Cinzia: Io sono stato |
| Marco: I have been/was |
| Cinzia: Tu sei stato |
| Marco: You have been/were |
| Cinzia: Lui/Lei è stato |
| Marco: He/she/it has been/was |
| Cinzia: Noi siamo stati |
| Marco: We have been/were |
| Cinzia: Voi siete stati |
| Marco: You have been/were |
| Cinzia: Loro sono stati |
| Marco: They have been/were |
| Cinzia: So my dear listeners, don't be scared, because it's very very easy. In the passato prossimo of the verb “to be” essere, you just find the present tense of the verb “to be” conjugated, plus the participle of the verb “to be” stato. So you have io sono, which is the present tense of the verb “to be”, plus stato, which is the past participle “to be”. |
| Marco: And altogether, io sono stato |
| Cinzia: Molto molto facile. |
| Marco: Very very easy. |
| Cinzia: And now, let's take a look at passato prossimo of the verb avere "to have". |
| Cinzia: Io ho avuto |
| Marco: I have had/had |
| Cinzia: Tu hai avuto |
| Marco: You have had/had |
| Cinzia: Lui/Lei ha avuto |
| Marco: He/She/It has had/had |
| Cinzia: Noi abbiamo avuto |
| Marco: We have had/had |
| Cinzia: Voi avete avuto |
| Marco: You have had/had |
| Cinzia: Loro hanno avuto |
| Marco: They have had/had |
| Cinzia: As you can see, the conjugation of the passato prossimo of the verb avere "to have", is really straightforward. |
| Marco: And why is that, Cinzia? |
| Cinzia: Because it’s just as before. We have io ho, present tense of the verb avere, plus avuto, past participle of the verb avere. So together, we have... |
| Marco: Io ho avuto. Ok, but let’s take a look now at some grammar. |
| Cinzia: I would call them details? |
| Marco: Yes, details. The first detail is that, just as our listeners have heard, we use the auxiliary essere with the verb essere, and we use the auxiliary avere with the verb avere. |
| Cinzia: For the conjugation of passato prossimo. |
| Marco: Exactly. The next thing that they haven’t noticed yet, is that when a verb requires the auxiliary essere, I repeat, auxiliary essere, its past participle has to be conjugated according to the gender and number of the subject it refers to. |
| Cinzia: So for example, in the phrase Noi siamo andati a Milano. |
| Marco: “We went to Milan.” |
| Cinzia: We have to match the past participle with the subject, because the past participle behaves just like an adjective. |
| Marco: For example, if I, a male, wanted to say “I have been”, I would use io sono stato. |
| Cinzia: Instead, if I want to say “I have been”, I should say io sono stata. |
| Marco: If it's me and a friend, be it male or female, I would say noi siamo stati, meaning “we have been”. |
| Cinzia: If it's me and another girl, we should say noi siamo state. |
| Marco: Because in her case, only two girls, so everything becomes feminine. |
| Cinzia: Yes. As you can see, the past participle just behaves as an adjective. |
| Marco: Yes. The past participle of verbs using the auxiliary essere. |
| Cinzia: It matches number and gender. |
| Marco: Instead, any verb that follows the auxiliary avere, doesn’t have to change, it’s always the same. |
Outro |
| Marco: Ok then, this will conclude today’s lesson. |
| Cinzia: Please be sure to pick up the PDF at Italianpod101.com. |
| Marco: Also, if you have any question, feel free to use our forum, or comment on today’s lesson. |
| Cinzia: See you again tomorrow! Ci vediamo domani! |
| Marco: Ciao! |
| Cinzia: Ciao ciao! |
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