Learn how to ask how much something costs in Italian as well as how to say "this" and "that"
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| INTRODUCTION |
| Cinzia: Buongiorno tutti! Mi chiamo Cinzia. |
| Marco: Marco here! Beginner series Season 1, Lesson 6 - What Will Shopping in Italy Cost You Without this Lesson? Buongiorno tutti! My name is Marco. |
| Cinzia: And I’m Cinzia. |
| Marco: And we’d like to welcome you to the sixth lesson of the Beginner series in ItalianPod101.com. |
| Marco: In this lesson, you will learn how to ask how much something costs in Italian, as well as how to say "this" and "that" in Italian |
| Cinzia: This conversation takes place in a flower shop. |
| Marco: And it is between Peter and a clerk. |
| Cinzia: And they’ll be speaking formal Italian. |
| DIALOGUE |
| Peter: Mi scusi, quanto costa questo? |
| Commesso: Un euro. |
| Peter: Quanto costa quello? |
| Commesso: Anche quello costa un euro. |
| Peter: Wow! Solo un euro...è molto economico! |
| Commesso: È normale in Italia, Signore |
| Peter: Wow! I fiori sono molto economici in Italia! |
| Anna: Quanto costano negli Usa? |
| Marco: One more time, slowly. |
| Peter: Mi scusi, quanto costa questo? |
| Commesso: Un euro. |
| Peter: Quanto costa quello? |
| Commesso: Anche quello costa un euro. |
| Peter: Wow! Solo un euro...è molto economico! |
| Commesso: È normale in Italia, Signore |
| Peter: Wow! I fiori sono molto economici in Italia! |
| Anna: Quanto costano negli Usa? |
| Marco: Once again, this time with the translation. |
| Peter: Mi scusi, quanto costa questo? |
| Peter: Excuse me, how much is this? |
| Commesso: Un euro. |
| Clerk: One euro. |
| Peter: Quanto costa quello? |
| Peter: How much is that? |
| Commesso: Anche quello costa un euro. |
| Clerk: That’s also one euro. |
| Peter: Wow! Solo un euro...è molto economico! |
| Peter: Wow! Just a euro...that’s very cheap! |
| Commesso: È normale in Italia, Signore |
| Clerk: It is normal in Italy, Sir. |
| Peter: Wow! I fiori sono molto economici in Italia! |
| Peter: Wow! Flowers are very cheap in Italy! |
| Anna: Quanto costano negli Usa? |
| Anna: How much are they in the U.S.A? |
| POST CONVERSATION BANTER |
| Marco: Now we’ll take a look at the vocabulary and phrases for this lesson. |
| VOCAB LIST |
| Cinzia: mi scusi [natural native speed] |
| Marco: Excuse me. (formal) |
| Cinzia: mi scusi [slowly - broken down by syllable] mi scusi [natural native speed] |
| Cinzia: quanto [natural native speed] |
| Marco: how much |
| Cinzia: quanto [slowly - broken down by syllable] quanto [natural native speed] |
| Marco: Next |
| Cinzia: costare [natural native speed] |
| Marco: to cost |
| Cinzia: costare [slowly - broken down by syllable] costare [natural native speed] |
| Marco: Next |
| Cinzia: questo [natural native speed] |
| Marco: this |
| Cinzia: questo [slowly - broken down by syllable] questo [natural native speed] |
| Marco: Next |
| Cinzia: euro [natural native speed] |
| Marco: Euro |
| Cinzia: euro [slowly - broken down by syllable] euro [natural native speed] |
| Marco: Next |
| Cinzia: quello [natural native speed] |
| Marco: that |
| Cinzia: quello [slowly - broken down by syllable] quello [natural native speed] |
| Marco: Next |
| Cinzia: solo [natural native speed] |
| Marco: only |
| Cinzia: solo [slowly - broken down by syllable] solo [natural native speed] |
| Marco: Next |
| Cinzia: economico [natural native speed] |
| Marco: cheap, economic |
| Cinzia: economico [slowly - broken down by syllable] economico [natural native speed] |
| Marco: Next |
| Cinzia: normale [natural native speed] |
| Marco: normal, regular, ordinary |
| Cinzia: normale [slowly - broken down by syllable] normale [natural native speed] |
| Marco: Next |
| Cinzia: USA [natural native speed] |
| Marco: U.S.A. |
| Cinzia: USA [slowly - broken down by syllable] USA [natural native speed] |
| VOCAB AND PHRASE USAGE |
| Cinzia: Let’s have a look at the usage of some of the words. The first word we will look at is - Mi scusi. |
| Marco: Cinzia, can you give us an example sentence, please? |
| Cinzia: Mi scusi, professore. |
| Marco: “Excuse me, professor.” But before continuing to mi scusi, let’s give our listeners a taste of the informal, that is… |
| Cinzia: Scusami. |
| Marco: One example, please. |
| Cinzia: Scusami, Marco. |
| Marco: “I am sorry, Marco.” |
| Cinzia: We have to point out, as you may have seen, that scusami should be used in informal situations. |
| Marco: While mi scusi for formal ones. |
| Cinzia: Yes! I would never say scusami to another person or someone I don’t know. Although between young people, like when I’m in a club and I want to get the bartender’s attention, I would use scusami. |
| Marco: And why is that? |
| Cinzia: Well, I am in an informal situation and furthermore, there are many young people. |
| Marco: Okay then, what is the next word? |
| Cinzia: The next word is quanto. |
| Marco: “How much?” Perfect! Next, we have a verb. |
| Cinzia: Costare. |
| Marco: “To cost.” Let us have one example comprising quanto and costare. |
| Cinzia: Quanto costa? |
| Marco: “How much is it?” |
| Cinzia: The next word we shall see is euro. |
| Marco: “Euro.” One example please. |
| Cinzia: Cinque euro. |
| Marco: “Five euro.” |
| Cinzia: Regarding pronunciation, English is very strange. |
| Marco: Why is that? |
| Cinzia: Well, they mix the pronunciation of /E/ and /U/ in EU. |
| Marco: True. We keep a distinct pronunciation of all four letters. |
| Cinzia: Yes! But we also mess up many English names. |
| Marco: Oh, yes! Just like in today’s dialogue, what did Anna say? |
| Cinzia: She said, USA. |
| Marco: That in English is U.S.A. Isn’t it funny, Cinzia? |
| Cinzia: Yes, Marco. Actually, it is very funny, especially because it just makes me think about the third person singular of the verb usare “use,” lui usa. |
| Marco: So, “He USA.” |
| Cinzia: Yes. |
| Marco: Yeah. |
| Cinzia: It sounds so strange. |
| Marco: It does, actually, but it’s a nice thing with languages. |
| Cinzia: And Marco, I also have something else. |
| Marco: What do you mean something else? |
| Cinzia: Did you ever hear, all of a sudden, people using the plural of euro. |
| Marco: You mean euri? |
| Cinzia: Yes! For example, instead of cinque euro, they usually say cinque euri. |
| Marco: Yes, I hear it very often, but to me, it sounds so strange. Yeah! I think old newspapers use “euro” euro in its singular form both for singular and the plural meaning. |
| Cinzia: Yeah, correct, Marco. I think euro is the best pronunciation. |
| Marco: Yes, and I think one reason is that as Italians, we like foreign words very much, so we maybe prefer to use euro that sounds so foreign, instead of euri that sounds so Italian. |
| Cinzia: Yes, it’s true. It sounds strange to me too. |
Lesson focus |
|---|
| Cinzia: Let’s take a look at today’s grammar. |
| Marco: Yes, and we shall start with the verb costare “to cost.” |
| Cinzia: Costare is usually used in the third person “it, they.” |
| Marco: So, for example, third person singular. |
| Cinzia: Costa. |
| Marco: “It costs.” And third person plural? |
| Cinzia: Costano. |
| Marco: “They cost.” |
| Cinzia: Please check the PDF for the full conjugation. |
| Marco: Now, let’s take a look at questo “this” and quello “that.” |
| Cinzia: And don’t forget that in Italian, we have masculine and feminine and singular and plural, even for questo and quello. |
| Marco: Perfect! For this lesson, we will only see the singular forms. Okay, Cinzia, take it from here. |
| Cinzia: Questo. |
| Marco: “This,” masculine singular. |
| Cinzia: Questa. |
| Marco: “This,” feminine singular. Okay, so, let’s give them two examples, first with masculine. |
| Cinzia: Questo fiore. |
| Marco: “This flower,” because flower is a masculine noun. Next, the feminine. |
| Cinzia: Questa bottiglia. |
| Marco: “This bottle.” Again, in this case, because bottiglia is a feminine noun. Now, let’s take a look at quello “that.” Also in this case, we will be offering the singular forms only. |
| Cinzia: Quello. |
| Marco: “That,” masculine singular. |
| Cinzia: Quella. |
| Marco: “That,” feminine singular. Two examples, please. |
| Cinzia: Quello studente. |
| Marco: “That student.” And feminine? |
| Cinzia: Quella bottiglia. |
| Marco: “That bottle.” |
| Cinzia: Questo and quello decline like normal nouns. |
| Marco: There are other forms that we will cover in future lessons. |
Outro |
| Marco: That’s it for today’s lesson. |
| Cinzia: Don’t forget to check out the lesson transcript in the PDF at ItalianPod1010.com. |
| Marco: Also, feel free to use our forum for your questions. And if you like to leave a comment, we’d be happy to respond. |
| Cinzia: And drop by! |
| Marco: Venite a trovarci! |
| Cinzia: Ciao ciao! |
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