Speak Conversational Italian in 30 Minutes

Hello everyone! Welcome to this course for beginners. In this course we are going to learn together all the basics, all the fundamentals for you to learn the Italian language. And this course will enable you to be able to get by once you go to Italy or to start putting down the We are going to go through a bunch of different things, which is a very technical definition for some grammar that would be slided in without you noticing, hopefully, or noticing that much. So let's start. The first chapter of this journey is how to pronounce properly vowels. What do we mean by that? Well, our words, Italian nouns, terms, verbs, end with vowels. Therefore, it is extremely important for us to get the pronunciation right. And in order to do that, we are going to hone in the pronunciation of vowels as our first chapter. So let's start First vowel is a. In Italian, you move your mouth horizontally and vertically. So a would be a. And you have to sort of emphasize this movement of the mouth. If you want your brain to register that is not like a, that's a. I is e. So this time around, we are trying to smile. And therefore, we move our mouth horizontally. In this case, our mouth doesn't move too much, but we have to pull. And you can see that my nerves in the neck are pulling. I'm going with my lips upwards to make the pronunciation i. So far, what we have learned is a, e, i, o. To do this very simply, we're going to do the goldfish mouth, o, o, u, u. Now, whereas English is sort of an entire wrinkle language, as I like to call it, Italian is exactly the opposite. So we actually have to make wrinkles on top of our lips in order to pronounce properly. U is u. It's not u, it's u, u. Once you get this five vowels down under your belt, you're ready to start. So before we move on, let's recap together. A, e, i, o, u. A, e, i, o, u. Now it's your turn. Repeat it, get this right, and then move on. Hello, everyone. So last time we talked about food, how to order food. This time around, how to go shopping. Yes, because I know everybody who comes here finds all sorts of things interesting. And so let's try to go and proceed with this where I'm going to teach you the basics, the fundamentals to be able to shop for clothes. So let's start. The basic of this is what we have discussed, posso avere. But now I'm going to teach you another way of saying that. So let's imagine that you're entering the shop and you're saying, to look for is cercare. To look for. Cercare means also to try, but that's not the case. Now I want to say, I'm looking for. So I have an easier way. Instead of your construction, be plus the verb in ing, I'm going to use my construction. To do so, very simply, I need to learn one more verb. That verb is stare. Stare. Stare. Let's go. Io sto, tu stai, lui, lei sta. Noi stiamo, voi state, loro stanno. Io sto, tu stai, lui, lei sta. Noi stiamo, voi state, loro stanno. Okay. Now, stare means to stay. It could also be used to say, how are you? Come stai? We have seen that in the greetings. Come stai? Sto bene. I could also use that verb to say, I stay in Italy. Okay. Io sto in Italia. But here, this stare has a different function. It does not have the meaning of to stay. It's just there because I need to say, I am doing something. So what I do is I use stare, conjugated version for stare, and then I use cercare, but I use it in a different form. I use the ing form for cercare. Cercare is a verb that ends in are. The ing form is ando. Okay. So cercare, cercando. So to say, I am looking for. Io sto cercando, tu stai cercando, lui, lei sta cercando, noi stiamo cercando, voi state cercando, loro stanno cercando. Nice and easy. You could do that with whatever verb tense, as long as it's are. Okay. So I am eating. Io sto mangiando. Io sto lavando. I'm washing. Io sto lavorando. I'm working. Okay. Io sto andando. Even though that verb is irregular. Okay. Io sto andando. I'm going. If it's ere, it's going to be endo. If it's ire, it's also going to be endo. All right. So we're not going to be concerned with that. But if you're going to say like, I'm finishing, that is, Io sto finendo. Io sto dormendo. Though I doubt you could say that about yourself. I'm sleeping. But okay. All right. Now let's go back on track. Io sto cercando. I don't need any for, I don't need any preposition. Io sto cercando something. All right. Let's go with the thing. So abbigliamento is what you're going to see up in the store, on the banner of the store, when you're looking for clothing. Okay. It's negozio di abbigliamento. Negozio, store, abbigliamento, clothing. Negozio di abbigliamento. Okay. Now, what can I possibly look for in a clothing store? Okay. Io sto cercando una maglietta, una maglietta, a shirt. Now, maglietta a maniche corte, short sleeve, a t-shirt, a maniche corte, senza maniche, without sleeve, senza maniche, a maniche lunghe. Okay. Long sleeve. Okay. So, una maglietta, a maniche corte, a maniche lunghe, senza maniche, maglietta. Una giacca, a jacket. Okay. Una giacca, jacket. Una giacca. Un paio, okay, a pair. Un paio di pantaloni, un paio di pantaloni, a pair of trousers. Un paio di pantaloni. Una gonna, una gonna, a skirt. Una camicia, that's either a blouse or a formal shirt for men. Una camicia. Un capello, a hat. Un capello, double B, double L. Un capello. Un paio di scarpe, a pair of shoes. Now, first thing that we have to know is how to say colors. Okay. White, bianco. Black, nero. Orange, arancione, arancione. Green, verde. Blue, blu. Purple, viola. Violet, violetto. Pink, rosa. Red, rosso. Red, rosso. Yellow, giallo. Gray, bianco. Brown, marrone. Okay. Let's try. Sto cercando una maglietta gialla because they have to agree. Sto cercando una maglietta gialla. Sto cercando una giacca blu. Sto cercando una camicia celeste, I would say here light blue, celeste, or azzurro. The two terms are interchangeable. Sto cercando una camicia celeste or una camicia azzurra. Sto cercando un paio di scarpe nere. Sto cercando una cintura e belt marrone. Okay. Second thing you have to know. Che taglia porta? That would be what size do you wear? Okay. Portare is to bring but also to wear. Okay. There's another verb that is indossare but it's way too formal so we're just going to use portare. The lady or the guy is going to tell you, the shop assistant is going to ask you, and you're going to reply. Porto. Porto. I wear. Io porto. La because it refers to size which is taglia. La. And then you're going to give the sizes. Quaranta. Quarantadue. Quarantasei. We use European sizes. Okay. Different from American sizes but you can kind of like say that also in different terms. La S standing for small. La M medium. La L L L. La XL. La due XL. La tre XL. La quattro XL. Etcetera. I don't think that Italian stores normally would have more than four XL but you can still try. When it comes to shoes is che numero porta? What number? Okay. And in that case we're going to say il. Il trentasei which is very small. Trentasei. Il trentasei. Il trentasette. Il trentotto. Il trentanove. Il quaranta. So on and so forth. Il quarantadue. Il quarantaquattro. Il quarantasei. When it comes to shoes you could say aperta. Una scarpa aperta. Open. Like a sandal. Una scarpa aperta. Una scarpa chiusa. Una scarpa di ginnastica. Like a sporty shoe. Una scarpa elegante. Elegant. For women you would need to say con tacco. With the heel. Senza tacco. Okay. So if you want to say can I try this on? You cannot use cercare. Is posso provarlo or provarla? That depends on the object. If the object is male, so masculine noun, right, for instance un paio di pantaloni, that would be male but plural, is posso provarli. Scarpe, feminine plural. Posso provarle. Jacket, feminine singular. Posso provarla. Cappello, masculine singular. Il cappello. Posso provarlo. That literally means can I try it on. Provare is for to try when you have to wear something. Lo or la. Li or le. Posso provarlo. Posso provarla. Posso provarli. Posso provarle. That's what you want to say. Now another way of saying that is dove è? Where is? Dove è il camerino? Il camerino. Where's the fitting room? They're just going to say la and point to the direction. Otherwise they're going to probably say in fondo. At the end. At the bottom. In fondo is like at the end of something. So most likely at the end of the store. In fondo. A destra, a destra, a sinistra. A destra, a sinistra. On your right, on your left. One last thing is you could ask for a size bigger or a size smaller and that would be which you guys know at this point. Una taglia, a size. Più piccola, più piccola. That doesn't change because it refers to taglia. Una taglia più piccola, una taglia più grande. Un numero di scarpe più piccolo, un numero di scarpe più grande. That's all you need to know. So practice, practice, practice. Memorize all of this. Write it down. Make it cement in your brain and you're going to be fine. We'll catch up next time. Hello everyone and welcome to this last chapter for beginners. Today we are going to have a short lesson on the difference between sapere and conoscere. Short premise, sapere and conoscere are extremely useful verbs, right? And that is what will get you colloquial when speaking with people in Italy. Sapere and conoscere, they both mean to know but they're used differently. Although there's a gray area in which the both of them can be used and their use is interchangeable and the two verbs overlap in meaning. Now let's start with conoscere which is very simple. Conoscere is to know. It does not indicate that you know very well. You could know something a little or you could have met somebody for the first time and use this verb which is conoscere. Now conoscere could be then very superficial or it could be that you really know something but it's used for individual objects. What I mean by that is cities, countries, places but also people, okay? So if I say it is only the expression da molto tempo for a very long time that indicates that I have some sort of deep knowledge about this person, right? I know that cafe. That is an expression that could mean I've been there several times. It doesn't mean that you know the owners. It doesn't mean that you know the ins and outs of that place, okay? It just means you've been there a few times, several times. So conoscere is used for individual specific objects such as people, places, countries and anything alike. On the contrary, sapere is used more for theoretical knowledges especially when they are broad not when they are very narrow. So tu sai un po' la storia degli stati uniti? Do you know a little the history of the United States? It's a theoretical knowledge. It's broad enough, okay? So theoretical knowledge, something that is factual, yes, but not extremely specific. It doesn't refer specifically to people in that sentence or two places in that sentence. Tu sai la matematica? Tu sai l'italiano? Okay. Theoretical knowledge, to know a language is sapere. Also sapere is used for when you mean to say you can do something. For example, in English you would say can you swim? Can you dance? Can you sing? In Italian, instead of can, you would use the verb to know, sapere. Sai ballare? Sai cantare? Sai nuotare? To swim? Sai ballare? Do you know how to dance? Sai cantare? Do you know how to sing? Sai nuotare? Do you know how to swim? So, to recap, conoscere for individuals, specific things. Sapere, it's more either broad, general theoretical knowledge or know how to do something. Sometimes, when we want to mention facts, things that we know, then we would use sai, sapere. Sai che lui si è sposato? Do you know that he just got married? Sai che? Now, sai is do you know, but don't worry too much about that because we're getting into the conjugations. First off, I wanted to remark the difference. Conoscere is used for individuals, specific places, cities, countries, but also people. Conosci Marco? Do you know Marco? Have you met Marco? Sapere, general knowledge, broader knowledge, so to speak, know how to do something. If we get very specific on something, then we are likely going to use conoscere. For instance, Conosci la storia di Reagan? Conosci la politica russa? Because we are honing in something we know specifically. It's no longer such a broad topic, it's a more restricted, more limited topic. So, let's go to the conjugations. Conoscere, very straightforward, is a regular conjugation. Io conosco. Tu conosci. Lui lei conosce. Noi conosciamo. Voi conoscete. Loro conoscono. Sapere, heavily regular. Io so. Tu sai. Lui lei sa. Noi sappiamo. Voi sapete. Loro sanno. Double N, so let's emphasize that. Loro sanno. You need to push out enough air. Loro sanno. Now, how do we use those expressions? Certainly we use it to make questions, but the other trick is that we can simply respond with Io lo so, or the opposite, the negative sentence, which would be Io non lo so, or Io lo conosco, or negative sentence, Io non lo conosco. So, especially when we refer to facts, factual knowledge, when somebody asks us, do you know such and such, not a specific person, but such and such, generally, that is lo, okay? So, lo so, non lo so. Lo conosco, non lo conosco. If somebody asks us about a specific person, then things might change. Specific people have genders and numbers. So, in that case, we are going to use lo if the person in question is a guy, one guy, lo. Conosci Marco? Si, lo conosco. No, non lo conosco. Conosci Sara? Si, la, la conosco. No, non la conosco. Conosci Marco e Sara? One male, one female. So, plural and masculine. Si, li, li conosco. The same li that we used to say there, it's the same li we are using here. Two different meanings, two different grammar pieces, but it's the same spelling, same pronunciation. Si, li conosco. Conosci Sara e Maria? Two women. So, this time around, we're going to say si le conosco. All right, guys, to recap, if you're not ready to use lo, la, li, la, you can still use lo. In general, we ask if somebody knows something by using either the verb conoscere or the verb sapere. Premise, people will understand you anyway. For broader knowledge, theoretical in nature, or to express how to do something, we use the verb sapere. Guys, let's learn conjugations, okay? We go nowhere without conjugations, okay? Tu sai que bla, bla, bla. If we want to refer to specific individuals, whether that is human beings or places, we're going to use conoscere. Conosci, bla, bla, bla. Answers. Si lo so, no, no lo so. Si lo conozco, la conozco, le conozco, no, no lo conozco, no la conozco, no le conozco, no le conozco. That's in reference to specific objects, right? Because specific objects have gender and number. One last piece of information that I want to leave you with is the expression, Now, this is an expression that is usually followed by che, and then after that you have an entire sentence, okay? Mi sa che, it means I feel that, I think that, I believe that. Very colloquial, okay? So we're going to say, mi sa che lui è pazzo. I think he's crazy. Mi sa che lei è fidanzata. I feel like, I've perceived, I've gathered that she is engaged. Mi sa che lei è fidanzata. You are expressing some sort of doubt. It's not a profound doubt. It's not existential. Certainly, you do not use this sentence, mi sa che, in more formal context, but you're inserting some sort of doubt there, okay? Expressing that you're not entirely sure, but you believe that is like that. Mi sa che sono senza speranza. I feel like I'm a lost cause, okay? Mi sa che, and then an entire sentence. Guys, as usual, practice, practice, practice, and I hope you have enjoyed this course. Ciao!