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CHAPTER 1

I spent the weekend in Rome – and wow, the weather was fantastic.

“I spent the weekend in Rome – and wow, the weather was fantastic.” Not such a complicated sentence in English, is it? Or is it…?

I have taught many people over the years, ranging from those who know no Italian at all, through to those who may have studied Italian for several years at school. Yet whether they have studied the language before or not, almost none of them tend to be able to construct a basic sentence like this when I first meet them.

Admittedly, they might know how to say other far less useful things, like: “I’m 37 years old and have two sisters and a goldfish” – an unusual conversation opener from my perspective – but they can’t say what they did at the weekend.

Well, in just a few minutes’ time, you will be able to do this – even if you’ve never learnt any Italian before.

Just remember though: don’t skip anything, don’t waste your time trying to memorise anything but do use your bookmark to cover up anything green you find on each page.

Okay now, let’s begin!

“I have” in Italian is:

Ho

(pronounced “o”¹)

And the word for “visited” in Italian is:

visitato

With this in mind, how would you say “I have visited”?

Ho visitato(o visit-art-oh)

Did you remember to cover up the green words while you worked out the answer?

“Naples” in Italian is:

Napoli

(nap-oh-lee)

So, with this in mind, how would you say “I have visited Naples”?

Ho visitato Napoli.

(o visit-art-oh nap-oh-lee)

The word for “Rome” in Italian is:

Roma

(roam-er)

So how would you say “I have visited Rome”?

Ho visitato Roma.

(o visit-art-oh roam-er)

Now, if I were to ask you how you would say simply “I visited Rome” rather than “I have visited Rome” you might not think you knew how to say that yet. However, you will be glad to hear that I would disagree with you because, in Italian, talking about what has happened in the past is far easier than it is in English. This is because “I visited Rome” and “I have visited Rome” are said in exactly the same way in Italian. I’ll show you what I mean.

Again, how would you say “I have visited Rome”?

Ho visitato Roma.

(o visit-art-oh roam-er)

I want you to now try to say “I visited Rome” bearing in mind that what you’re going to say is exactly the same as what you just said for “I have visited Rome”. So, “I visited Rome” will be:

Ho visitato Roma.

(o visit-art-oh roam-er)

As you can see, it is exactly the same. Italians do not make a distinction between the two. Effectively, you have got two English past tenses for the price of one. And actually it is even better than that.

You can now already correctly say “I have visited Rome” and “I visited Rome” because they are exactly the same in Italian. With this in mind, do you think you can make a lucky guess about how you might say “I did visit Rome”? Just take a wild guess!

Ho visitato Roma.

(o visit-art-oh roam-er)

Once again, it is exactly the same in Italian. “I have visited Rome”, “I visited Rome” and “I did visit Rome” are all said in precisely the same way. In fact this is one of the many wonderful things about Italian: you get three English tenses for the price of one Italian one! “I have visited Rome”, “I visited Rome” and “I did visit Rome” are all simply:

Ho visitato Roma.

(o visit-art-oh roam-er)

Let’s try this 3 For the Price of 1 Special Offer again now but this time with a different example.

To say “I have spent” in Italian, you will literally say “I have passed”, which in Italian is:

Ho passato

(o pass-art-oh)

“The weekend” in Italian is:

il weekend

(eel weekend)

So how would you say “I have spent the weekend” (literally “I have passed the weekend”)?

Ho passato il weekend

(o pass-art-oh eel weekend)

And how would you say simply “I spent the weekend” / “I passed the weekend”?

Ho passato il weekend

(o pass-art-oh eel weekend)

Just as “I visited Rome” and “I have visited Rome” are no different from one another in Italian, so “I spent the weekend” and “I have spent the weekend” are also no different from one another.

How do you think you would you say “I did spend the weekend”?

Ho passato il weekend

(o pass-art-oh eel weekend)

Again, you have three English past tenses for the price of one in Italian.

“I spent the weekend”, “I have spent the weekend”, “I did spend the weekend” – it’s all the same in Italian: “Ho passato il weekend”.

“In Rome” in Italian is:

a Roma

(a roam-er)

So how would you say “I have spent the weekend in Rome”?

Ho passato il weekend a Roma.

(o pass-art-oh eel weekend a roam-er)

And how would you say “I spent the weekend in Rome”?

Ho passato il weekend a Roma.

(o pass-art-oh eel weekend a roam-er)

And “I did spend the weekend in Rome”?

Ho passato il weekend a Roma.

(o pass-art-oh eel weekend a roam-er)

Time to steal some words!

Word Robbery Number 1

Let’s forget our weekend in Rome for just one moment now and start stealing some words. Around half the words in modern English have come into our language via Latin languages, such as Italian. Once you can identify them, you will have a large, instant, usable vocabulary in Italian. After all, why bother learning Italian vocabulary when you can simply steal it?

The first group of words we are going to steal are words that end in “ic” and “ical” in English.

Words like “romantic”, “fantastic”, “political”, “illogical” and so on.

There are around 750 of these in English and they are largely similar in Italian, except that in Italian they end in “ico” (pronounced “eek-oh”), becoming “romantico”, “fantastico”, “politico”, “illogico” and so on.

Let’s now see how we can use these to begin expanding our range of expressions in Italian!

Words stolen so far 750

Bearing in mind what we’ve just learnt in the Word Robbery above, let’s change the “ic” on the end of the English word “romantic” into “ico”.

Doing this, what will “romantic” be in Italian?

romantico

(roe-man-teek-oh)

And so what would “fantastic” be in Italian?

fantastico

(fan-tass-teek-oh)

Let’s now try doing the same with “ical” and change the “ical” on the end of “political” into “ico”.

Doing this, what will “political” be in Italian?

politico

(pol-ee-teek-oh)

And what will “illogical” be?

illogico

(ee-lodge-eek-oh)

Let’s now try using these “ico” words to expand our range of expressions and to make some more complex sentences in Italian.

“It was” in Italian is:

Era

(air-ah)

So, how would you say “it was illogical”?

Era illogico.

(air-ah ee-lodge-eek-oh)

And how would you say “it was political”?

Era politico.

(air-ah pol-ee-teek-oh)

How about “it was romantic”?

Era romantico.

(air-ah roe-man-teek-oh)

Finally, how would you say “it was fantastic”?

Era fantastico.

(air-ah fan-tass-teek-oh)

Now, do you remember how to say “I have visited” in Italian?

Ho visitato

(o visit-art-oh)

And what about “I visited”?

Ho visitato

(o visit-art-oh)

And “I did visit”?

Ho visitato

(o visit-art-oh)

Do you remember how to say “I have spent”, “I did spend”, “I spent” (literally “I have passed”)?

Ho passato

(o pass-art-oh)

And so how would you say “I spent the weekend”?

Ho passato il weekend

(o pass-art-oh eel weekend)

What is “in Rome” in Italian?

a Roma

(a roam-er)

So how would you say “I spent the weekend in Rome”?

Ho passato il weekend a Roma.

(o pass-art-oh eel weekend a roam-er)

And once more, what is “it was” in Italian?

Era

(air-ah)

Now, “era” can be used in Italian to mean both “it was” and also just “was”. “The weather” in Italian is:

il tempo

(eel tem-poe)

So how would you say “the weather was…”?

il tempo era…

(eel tem-poe air-ah)

Now again, what was “fantastic” in Italian?

fantastico

(fan-tass-teek-oh)

And so how would you say “the weather was fantastic”?

Il tempo era fantastico.

(eel tem-poe air-ah fan-tass-teek-oh)

And how would you say “I spent the weekend in Rome. The weather was fantastic.”?

Ho passato il weekend a Roma. Il tempo era fantastico.

(o pass-art-oh eel weekend a roam-er. eel tem-poe air-ah fan-tass-teek-oh)

If you want to show that you’re amazed or impressed by something in Italian, you can, just as in English, say “wow”.

So, just to make this clear, what is “wow” in Italian?

wow

(wow)

Good.

The word for “and” in Italian is:

e

(ay)

So, how would you say “…and wow…”?

…e wow…

(ay wow)

Putting what you’ve learnt together, say “I spent the weekend in Rome – and wow, it was fantastic.” Take your time to work this out, bit by bit, there’s no rush.

Ho passato il weekend a Roma – e wow, il tempo era fantastico.

(o pass-art-oh eel weekend a roam – er ay wow, eel tem-poe air-ah fan-tass-teek-oh)

You can now construct the sentence with which we started the chapter – and, as you will soon discover, this is just the very beginning of your journey into Italian!

Building Blocks

You just learnt how to say (amongst other things) “I spent the weekend in Rome – and wow, the weather was fantastic”.

Now that you can do this, you are going to move on to expand what you can say through the use of additional “building blocks”.

The new building blocks you are going to learn will allow you to begin instantly expanding your range of expressions in the Italian language.

So far, some of the building blocks you have already learnt include:

You already know how to use these building blocks to construct a sentence. Once again, how would you say “I have spent the weekend in Rome”?

As you can see, you already know how to build the four building blocks above into a sentence. Take a look now at the six new building blocks below. Just have a glance over them and then I’ll show you how you’re going to add these into the mix of what you’ve learnt so far.

Okay, first things first: please don’t to try to memorise them. No, no, no! Instead, I simply want you to play with your building blocks. After all, that’s what building blocks are for, isn’t it?

The way you’re going to play with them is like this: on the next page, they have been put into four piles and all I want you to do is to make sentences with them. You’ll do this by using one building block from the first pile, one from the second, one from the third and one from the fourth.

You will find that you can say a lot of different things using them in this way and it’s up to you what sentences you make. The only thing I want you to make sure you do is to use every building block at least once. Also, please don’t bother writing down the sentences you make. Instead, say them out loud. Or, if you’re not in a place where you can do this, say them in your head. Now, off you go; make as many sentences as you can!

* Remember, of course, that “ho passato” means “I have spent”, “I spent” and “I did spend”. And this means, of course, that “ha passato” means “you have spent”, “you spent” and “you did spend”. And therefore “abbiamo passato” means not only “we have spent” but also “we spent” and “we did spend”. Don’t forget, you get three English past tenses for the price of one in Italian and this applies whether you’re saying “I…”, “you…”, “we…” or whatever.

The Checklist

You have now reached the final part of Chapter 1. Once you have finished this short section you will not only have completed your first chapter but you will also understand how this book works. All the other chapters follow the same pattern, with your Italian becoming ever more sophisticated as you complete each chapter.

The section you are now on will be the final part of each chapter and is what I call “The Checklist”. It involves nothing more than a read-through of a selection of words or expressions you have so far encountered.

You will actually see The Checklist twice. The first time you will see that the Italian words are written in black (on the left-hand side) and that the English words are written in green (on the right-hand side) – and you know what green means… cover up!

So, what I want you to do here is to cover up the English words (which are written in green on the right-hand side) while you read through the list of Italian words on the left. Read through them all, from the top of the list to the bottom, and see if you can recall what they mean in English (uncover one green word at a time to check if you’ve remembered the meaning correctly). If you can go through the entire list, giving the correct English meaning for each of the Italian words / expressions without making more than three mistakes in total, then you’re done. If not, then go through the list again. Keep doing this, either working from the top of the list to the bottom or from the bottom to the top (it doesn’t matter which) until you can do it without making more than three mistakes.

Got it? Then let’s go!

il weekend (eel weekend)	the weekend
romantico (roe-man-teek-oh)	romantic
fantastico (fan-tass-teek-oh)	fantastic
politico (pol-ee-teek-oh)	political
illogico (ee-lodge-eek-oh)	illogical
Ho (o)	I have
visitato (visit-art-oh)	visited
Ho visitato (o visit-art-oh)	I have visited / I visited / I did visit
Roma (roam-er)	Rome
Napoli (nap-oh-lee)	Naples
Ho visitato Napoli. (o visit-art-oh nap-oh-lee)	I have visited Naples / I visited Naples / I did visit Naples.
passato (pass-art-oh)	spent
Ho passato (o pass-art-oh)	I have spent / I spent / I did spend
Ha (a)	You have
Ha passato (a pass-art-oh)	You have spent / You spent / You did spend
Abbiamo (ab-ee-arm-oh)	We have
Abbiamo passato (ab-ee-arm-oh pass-art-oh)	We have spent / We spent / We did spend
settembre (se-tem-bray)	September
il Natale (eel nat-arl-ay)	Christmas
a Roma (a roam-er)	in Rome
in Italia (een eet-al-yer)	in Italy
in Svizzera (een zvee-tser-er)	in Switzerland
Abbiamo passato il Natale in Svizzera. (ab-ee-arm-oh pass-art-oh eel nat-arl-ay een zvee-tser-er)	We spent Christmas in Switzerland.
Ha passato settembre in Italia. (a pass-art-oh se-tem-bray een eet-al-yer)	You spent September in Italy.
e (ay)	and
Era (air-ah)	It was
Era fantastico. (air-ah fan-tass-teek-oh)	It was fantastic.
Il tempo era fantastico. (eel tem-poe air-ah fan-tass-teek-oh)	The weather was fantastic.
Ho passato il weekend a Roma – e wow, il tempo era fantastico. (o pass-art-oh eel weekend a roam-er ay wow, eel tem-poe air-ah fan-tass-teek-oh)	I spent the weekend in Rome – and wow, the weather was fantastic.

Finished working through that checklist and made fewer than three mistakes?Yes? Wonderful!

As that’s the case, what I now want you to do is repeat exactly the same process with the checklist below, except that this time you’ll be reading through the English and trying to recall the Italian. You’ll be doing it the other way around. Just relax and work your way up and down the list until you can give the correct Italian translation for each of the English words / expressions again without making more than three mistakes in total. It’s not a competition – and I’m not asking you to memorise them. Just look at the English words (on the left-hand side) while you cover up the green Italian words on the right-hand side and see if you can remember how to say them in Italian. You’ll be surprised by how many you get right, even on the first try.

Okay, off you go!

the weekend	il weekend (eel weekend)
romantic	romantico (roe-man-teek-oh)
fantastic	fantastico (fan-tass-teek-oh)
political	politico (pol-ee-teek-oh)
illogical	illogico (ee-lodge-eek-oh)
I have	Ho (o)
visited	visitato (visit-art-oh)
I have visited / I visited / I did visit	Ho visitato (o visit-art-oh)
Rome	Roma (roam-er)
Naples	Napoli (nap-oh-lee)
I have visited Naples / I visited Naples / I did visit Naples.	Ho visitato Napoli. (o visit-art-oh nap-oh-lee)
spent	passato (pass-art-oh)
I have spent / I spent / I did spend	Ho passato (o pass-art-oh)
You have	Ha (a)
You have spent / You spent / You did spend	Ha passato (a pass-art-oh)
We have	Abbiamo (ab-ee-arm-oh)
We have spent / We spent / We did spend	Abbiamo passato (ab-ee-arm-oh pass-art-oh)
September	settembre (se-tem-bray)
Christmas	il Natale (eel nat-arl-ay)
in Rome	a Roma (a roam-er)
in Italy	in Italia (een eet-al-yer)
in Switzerland	in Svizzera (een zvee-tser-er)
We spent Christmas in Switzerland.	Abbiamo passato il Natale in Svizzera. (ab-ee-arm-oh pass-art-oh eel nat-arl-ay een zvee-tser-er)
You spent September in Italy.	Ha passato settembre in Italia. (a pass-art-oh se-tem-bray een eet-al-yer)
and	e (ay)
It was	Era (air-ah)
It was fantastic.	Era fantastico. (air-ah fan-tass-teek-oh)
The weather was fantastic.	Il tempo era fantastico. (eel-tem-poe air-ah fan-tass-teek-oh)
I spent the weekend in Rome – and wow, the weather was fantastic.	Ho passato il weekend a Roma – e wow, il tempo era fantastico. (o pass-art-oh eel weekend a roam-er ay wow, eel-tem-poe air-ah fan-tass-teek-oh)

Well, that’s it, you’re done with Chapter 1! Don’t forget, you mustn’t try to hold onto or remember anything you’ve learnt here. Anything you learn in earlier chapters will be brought up again and reinforced in later chapters. You don’t need to do extra work or make any effort to memorise anything. The book has been organised to do that for you. Off you go and have a rest. You’ve earned it!

Between Chapters Tip!

Between chapters, I’m going to be giving you various tips on language learning. These will range from useful tips about the Italian language itself to advice on how to fit learning a language into your daily routine. Ready for the first one? Here it is!

Tip Number One – study (at least a little) every day!

Learning a language is like building a fire – if you don’t tend to it, it will go out. So, once you have decided to learn a foreign language, you really should study it every day.

It doesn’t have to be for a long time though. Just five or ten minutes each day will be enough, so long as you keep it up. Doing these five or ten minutes will stop you forgetting what you’ve already learnt and, over time, will let you put more meat on the bones of what you’re learning.

As for what counts towards those five or ten minutes, well, that’s up to you. Whilst you’re working with this book, I would recommend that your five or ten minutes should be spent here, learning with me. Once you’re done here, however, your daily study could be spent reading an Italian newspaper, watching an Italian film, or chatting with an Italian-speaking acquaintance. You could even attend a class if you want to learn in a more formal setting. The important thing is to make sure that you do a little every day.