Edward Hendriks
When I first came to Italy in the year 2000, I didn't speak a word of Italian. But since that great first time in Italy, I have returned many times and the interest in learning Italian has also increased. First I took an LOI course on CD for the car. Then I wanted more. In 2009 I went to Naples for a month for a intensive course.
community College
Back in the Netherlands, I took Italian classes at the Volksuniversiteit for another five years. I still don't speak Italian very well (unfortunately I practice too little for that), but still…
The trips to Italy have become a lot more interesting, because it is easier to make contact with the residents. I would like to give you a few examples that come to mind spontaneously.
The first time
The first time I could have more or less a real conversation in Italian was during my stay in Naples. I went to limone, a shop of one of the most famous brands of limoncello, and I struck up a conversation with the owner.
He complimented me on how well organized everything in Dutch was. According to him, it was all one big chaos in Italy in general and in Naples in particular.
I objected that it was sometimes too organized in the Netherlands ('troppo organization') and that the Italian chaos was sometimes refreshing for us Dutch. I don't believe he understood me.
He proudly showed me his lemon peels floating in a vat of alcohol. He casually asked me if I knew Valkenburg aan de Geul. He sold his limoncello to the owner of 'the only caves in the Netherlands', something he himself could hardly believe. It was a revelation to be able to communicate like this.
Spontaneous conversations in Italian
A few years later we were cooling off in the hills of the Apennines by a river. The owner of an Italian motorhome saw us park and spoke to us spontaneously.
According to him, the Netherlands was one of the most beautiful countries in Europe. And Denmark, that was beautiful too.
I told him that we also liked Italy so much and he thanked me for the compliments. A nice spontaneous conversation that you can have with someone if you speak a few words of Italian and that can enrich your holiday experience considerably.
in Sicily
A while back I was in Sicily with a friend. The owner of an apartment in Cefalù where we were to stay, picked us up with his car, because as tourists we were traveling with our rental car couldn't get into the historic city center.
After I had spoken the first Italian words, the Italian poured out his waterfall of speech. It was about the municipality with its bizarre policy against tourists, it was about his family and his apartment and about the splendor of the city.
He needed little encouragement to continue talking, but it was still nice to be able to talk to an 'ordinary' Italian about more complicated subjects than just asking the groceries or asking for directions.
More difficult subjects
The better you speak Italian, the more difficult topics than the weather and small talk can also be discussed. During our last long holiday in Italy I got into a conversation with the neighbors of the apartment that we were passing through Airbnb had rented.
They were surprised to hear that I spoke Italian and spontaneously invited me and my family for a drink. Appetizers and prosecco came on the table and they asked me the question.
They knew the Netherlands from the flowers. But what else were we actually known for? Wash everything in the Netherlands also as expensive as in Italy? And what did I actually think of all those situations with migrants from Africa and the failing policy of the European authorities? Had the euro brought us wealth or poverty?
The conversations gradually became longer and more interesting. But it also took me more effort to find answers. Not only because of the search for the right words in Italian, but also because the questions became more difficult and the discussions more in-depth, even though I understood well what it meant.
English
Still, it's a shame to see that Italians' English is often better than mine. And that we automatically fall back on English as often as French language.
Perhaps we should soon again opt for a truly rural area, where you can only make yourself understood in Italian. I sometimes feel like a good conversation in Italian.
Tip: if you want to learn to speak Italian yourself, you can start with the Holiday Italian course or for Italian course at A1 level which This is Italy has recently been offering.
Photo: Pixabay
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