CBI 1:25 | Using the phone in Italian

Coffee Break Italian Season 1 Episode 25 Bonjour à tous et bienvenue à Coffee Break Italian et au Sonomarque. Ciao à tous et à sona Francesca. Bonjour no sonocati. And we're back with another episode of Coffee Break Italian for you. In this episode we'll be reviewing some of the content that we covered last time and of course we'll be looking at some new content. We promised last time that we were going to be dealing with one of those really tricky areas and that is using the phone in Italian. All right, how are you? How are you? I'm fine, thank you. How are you? I'm fine, thank you. And you too, Mar. How are you? I'm a little sick, but apart from that, everything is fine. Very fine? Very nice. Thank you. Okay, let's get on with our lesson. We're ready. Yes. All right, let's go. We'll be doing a little bit of review. Now we've mentioned a little bit of review and we'll actually be doing a review as we go through this lesson. You'll remember last time we were looking at the A-R-E verbs. We conjugated the full verb "parlare". Now we'll be doing a little more of that as we come across some new A-R-E verbs. And this lesson too, however for the time being, let's go on and talk about the main topic for today and that is using the phone. Francesca. What happens when you lift up the phone in Italy? What do you say when you lift up the phone? You say "pronto". And what does "pronto" literally mean? It means "ready". So you would say "pronto" and I would say "pronto". It doesn't matter if you're me or female, it's always "pronto". "Pronto". So that's what you would say if you're answering the phone. If you lift up the phone in Italy or in Italy speaking area, you would have to say "pronto". Yeah. Okay. Now the fact is, we might really need to learn how to make the call. For example, we might be phoning up to Buccaruima in a hotel. We might be making a reservation in a restaurant. We might be phoning for some information. So let's start to think about the freezes and the expressions that we need in order to make that call. So imagine I've lifted up the phone in a hotel or something like that and I say "pronto". What's the first thing in an Italian phone conversation that you're most likely to do in Francesca? I think you're most likely to introduce yourself and say what your name is. And we already know to see that. So Katie, can you tell us how you would say "my name is Katie", for example? Mi chiamo Katie. Okay. And what about if you're giving your second name? If I were saying "I'm Mr Pendleton", how would I say that? Sono il Signor Pendleton. And listen carefully to this because it's a little bit different. There's something in there that you might not expect. So there's a definite article. And obviously if it's a masculine signor, then we need to say "il Signor". Sono il Signor Smith. Sono il Signor Jovinetto. And of course, if it's a feminine person who's introducing herself, what would she say? Sono la Signora Ferrari. Sono la Signora Ferrari, okay? Or what about "I am miss something"? You could say "Sono la Signorina Ferrari", but I think nowadays women wouldn't say that anymore. Okay. Yeah, I think "Signorina" is probably a little outdated in a sense. It is. It carries a certain. Well, a certain. It just sounds a bit old fashioned. Yes. Now, one thing that we need to think about here is the fact that we're using "Sono", the verb for "I am". Sono. Giuseppe. "I am Giuseppe". Sono Mark. Sono Katie. Sono Francesca. "I am". But in English, of course, if we were on the phone, we wouldn't say "I am Mark". We would say "It's Mark". So just remember that when you're saying "It's Mark" calling, or whatever your name is, calling, you use "Sono". "I am from the verb "essere" to be. So let's take our conversation up to this point. I want to the phone, Francesca, you're going to say who you are. OK. Pronto. Buongiorno. Sono la signora Valeria Rossi. A buongiorno, signora Rossi. Eh, disturbo. No, non disturba fatto. Eh, posso parlare con il signor Matteo Verdi, per favore. Mi dispiace, il signor Verdi non c'è. OK, Katie, you've not been speaking very much in this episode, so let's bring you in now and let's see how much of that you understood. We'll do the conversation again and see if you can decide what's happening in this conversation. Va bene? OK. OK. Pronto. Buongiorno. Ah, buongiorno, signora Rossi. Eh, disturbo? Ah, mi dispiace, il signor Verdi non c'è. OK, now obviously we'll continue this conversation a little later, but let's go through so far of what we've done. I said pronto, which of course is the way we're seeing. Hello. Yeah, it's like when you pick up the phone and then Francesca said, "Bongiorno, sono la signora Valeria Rossi." Which would mean? She's introducing herself. Hello, I am Mrs Valeria Rossi. Yeah, Mrs. The Mrs. La Signora. "Sono la signora Valeria Rossi." And I said, "Bongiorno, signora Rossi." And then Francesca or Signora Rossi said an interesting word. Disturbo. Any ideas what that might mean, Katie? It sounds a little like "disturbo." Absolutely. I would guess that it means am I just stopping you? Absolutely, yeah. And it's a very straightforward word because it's literally the verb disturbare to disturb. So, "I disturb disturbo." How would you say, "You disturb an informal sense, Katie?" Disturbo? Si, disturbo, bene. And then if you were talking about someone else, he disturbs. Disturba? Si, perfetto, disturba. And here I replied to Valeria Rossi saying, "No, non disturba fatto. Non disturba affatto." I'm using the "lay form," the polite form, so that's the same as the "he" or "she" form. Non disturba. You're not disturbing and "affatto" means "at all." Non disturba affatto. Do you try saying that? Non disturba affatto. Perfect. Why don't we go through the rest of the conjugation of disturbare? Good idea. Katie, how do we say, "We disturb? Disturbiamo?" Si, bene. Disturbiamo. And you plural disturb? Disturbate? Si, disturbate. And "they disturb." Disturbano? Bravo, si, ma, disturbano. Si. Well, then, Katie, so just note the "disturbiamo." That's the kind of thing that you could quite easily say, "Are we disturbing you?" Disturbiamo, so making it into a question, just by changing the intonation of your voice. Are we disturbing you? Disturbiamo. And note that we don't even need a word for "you" in there. Disturbing in general? Disturbiamo. Or if you're in a conversation of where you're asking, "I'm disturbing you," then you would just say, "disturbo" making it a question. Disturbo. And of course, you'll be told, "No, no, no, no, no, disturba affatto. You're not disturbing at all." Okay. Then Francesca, as Valeria Rossi, asked, "Can I speak to Mr. Matteo Verdi?" Now, Katie, can you work out or can you remember how Francesca, as Valeria Rossi said that? Well, can I be "poso" and then "parlare" so "poso parlare" con il "signor Matteo Verdi?" Benissimo. Benissimo. So "poso parlare" can I speak? We've done that lots of times where we're combining the modal verb "poso" meaning can I or I can with an infinitive "parlare" in this case, can I speak? Can I speak? Poso parlare and you remember that it's con il "signor Matteo Verdi" with the Mr. Matteo Verdi Matthew Green. Matteo Verdi. Yes, right. So can I speak to Mr. Matteo Green? And then I said, "mi dispiace non c'è." I'm sorry, he's not here. Yes, I'm sorry, he's not here. Non c'è, we would use that in the sense of in questa città non c'è una piscina. In this town there is no swimming pool. So c'è, we know as there is or there are would be ci sono, but in questa città non c'è una piscina. There is no swimming pool. But here we're not saying there is no Mr. Matteo Verdi, but that's how we use it. We just say, "non c'è." He's not here. Now there are other ways of saying that. We could literally say, "he is not here." Si, non è qui. Non è qui. Non è qui. Or for example, "he's not available at the moment." Non è disponibile al momento. Non è disponibile al momento. Disponibile is the word for "available" and "al momento" at the moment. Can we say in questo momento? Si, non è disponibile in questo momento. Okay, so various possibilities there. And of course we will be understanding these because the factors were likely to be folding ourselves and these are the answers. che vi mi sono qui, se vi è visto per lui, per un'altra parte. Ok, noi ho fatto una conversazione di questo. E il problema che noi sono a fare è attivare un po' più. È ancora una situazione formala. Valeria Rossi è attivare Matteo Verdi, e noi sono attivare un po' più alla conversazione. Let's have a listen now. Pronto? Buongiorno, sono la signora Valeria Rossi. Ha buongiorno, signora Rossi. Disturbo? E posso parlare con il signor Matteo Verdi, per favore? Mi dispiace il signor Verdi non c'è. Ah, e. Vole lasciare un messaggio. Si, grazie. E li può dire che ho chiamato e che richiamo domani. Si, referisco, perfetto. Grazie mille, arriveterci. Riveterla. Ok, there were a few new words in there. Can we listen again, please? Disturbo? Ah, e. Si, grazie. Riveterla. Ok, kitty. No, hai asked a question to Valeria Rossi when we realized that signor Matteo Verdi was not available or was not here. I said, "Vole lasciare un messaggio." Can you work it while that might mean? Well, the last word sends a bit like message. That's correct. So, I'm going to guess it's something to do with leaving a message. Absolutely. No, it's interesting because we used "Vole". "Vole" is from which verb? Francesca. From verb "Volere". "Volere" means? Do want. To want. So "Vole" is the polite form of "do you want?" "Vole" and then what kind of verb is it going to be followed by? Do you want to do something? An infinitive. An infinitive because it's one of these models just like "Posso can I?". "Vole", "do you want?". How do we say "I want?". "Volio". "Volio". So, how would we say "I want to speak with Mr. Matteo Verdi?" "Catti". "Volio parlare con il Senior Verdi". Although it's a little bit rude in a way, as I want to speak with Mr. Verdi. That's why we would change it. We would actually use a more polite form. "Vore" I would like, but we don't want to confuse things in a moment. No, no. I would think carefully about the "Volio", meaning "I want". It might sound a little bit rude, but nonetheless "Volio", "I want". Now, the "you" in formal form is something that we've actually heard before. How do we say "do you want" or "you want?". "Voi". Quite a tricky word to get your tongue around. Three vowels. "Voi". "Voi". Yes, like if you think of it as "V", "W", "O", "Y", in English. It's not a good idea, but that may help you think about how you would pronounce "Voi". So we've got "Volio", "Voi", "Vole". "Volio", "Voi", "Vole". "Catti", "Guess", how you would say "We want". "Voliamo", "Si", "Bene", "Voliamo". So they were replying these rules and patterns that we're learning as we're looking at verbs to a new word, a completely new verb "Volere". And it did just not even an "are" word, it's an "ere" word and it's quite irregular. "Volio", "Voi", "Vole", "Voliamo". And then the other two remaining forms are "Volete". "You all want the plural form". "Volete". And then the final part is "Voliono", "they want". Let's hear the whole verb from Francesca. "Volio", "Voi", "Vole", "Voliamo", "Volete", "Voliono". "Catti", "Volio", "Volio", "Voliamo", "Volete", "Voliono". Perfecto, brava. We're introducing a new verb then "Volere" to want and we were using the formal form, asking the question "Vole, lasciare un messaggio". "L'ascare" is the verb "to leave". It's an "are" verb, a regular verb so we could learn "lacio", "laxi", "lacia", "laciamo", "laciate", "laciano". Bravo, Marco. Interrompiamo questa trasmissione per una comunicazione importante. Se vado a fare una progressione più grande con l'italia, non vi vado a raggiare la prima versione di questo corso, perciò la vera versione delle lezioni, compliezione delle lezioni e lezioni di borsa e lezioni di materiale. Allora, cosa spetti? E cosa ho potuto fare? Se vado a farla l'italia alla prossima, vado a farla l'italia in plus.com. Ok, let's get on with the lesson. Now, the message that Bravalleria Rossi left was a little complicated, let's have a listen to it again. Ok, "li può dire che ho chiamato e che ricchiamo domani". Let's split this up. Let's listen to the first part. "li può dire che ho chiamato". Ok, there are a few words that we do already know in their kitty. Can you identify some of them? "Dire", which means? "Tut, tell, see". Yeah, "to tell or to say". So, something about telling him, presumably, because we're talking about "Senor Verdi", so "ri può dire". "What does "po" mean? "You can". "You can", and it's the formal form, so "you can tell, "po dire", and therefore what do you think the "li" might mean in there? "Word", that means "him". Yeah, it's like him. It's kind of "to him". Can you say "to him", the "li" becomes "to him". So "li può dire to him", "can you tell or can you say"? "Che ho chiamato". No, you know what? "Oh" means "I have". And we are using a new verb "chiamato", which comes from the verb "chiamare", and I believe we've seen that verb before. "Mi chiamo". "Mi chiamo", of course, so I call myself literally. So, what do you think "che ho chiamato", might mean? "That I have called, baby". Exactly, "che ho chiamato", I have called, now that's a different tense. We've not looked at that tense of the verb before, that I have called, it's actually called the "perfect tense", but don't worry about it just now, just let's think of this as a piece of a vocabulary. So "li può dire che ho chiamato". Can you tell him that I've called? Can you do the same with "li può dire" as you can with "mi può consigliare", because I think in a previous lesson we learned that you can say "mi può consigliare" or "può consigliare mi". So can you do the same with this? Very good question, Katie, in a one-a-domanda. You can do the same with "conciliare" and "dire". So basically, you're left with "dir", we remove the "a" of the ending "dire", so we are left with "dir", and we attach "li" at the end, and it becomes one word "dirli". So we can either say "li può dire" or "può dirli". It's quite a tricky word, it's a tricky. Try it? "può dirli?" "dirli". "dirli". "dirli". "dirli". "dirli". "dirli". "dirli". Maybe it's easier for you "li può dire", maybe. The "li" sound is pronounced slightly differently in different parts of Italy, would that be fair? It is, yeah. So sometimes more "li" and sometimes more "li". It's slightly different pronunciations, but don't worry about that. "li può dire" or "può dirli". So. Can you tell him that I've called li podire che o chiamato? Now, before we move on from here, let's just think about this "l" a little more, because that's "to him". Can you tell him I've called? Francesca, how would we say "can you tell her" that I've called? That's slightly different. To her in Italian is "le". So, can you tell her that I've called would be "le podire che o chiamato" or "po dirle che o chiamato". That one's a little easier than "to him". So "to him" is "le" to her "le". And we'll come across those words again, because they're really very useful. They're used in many, many situations in Italian. Okay, so that was the first part. "li podire che o chiamato" and then Valeria Rossi went on to say, "è che ricchiamo domani". So, that's straightforward enough if you just think about the "ri" part of "ricchiamo" and we already know the word "domani". Katie, what does that mean? "è che ricchiamo domani". "A phone back tomorrow?" Absolutely, that literally I am calling again tomorrow, "che ricchiamo domani". It's a present tense, "che ricchiamo", "chiamo", "ai call", "ricchiamo", "ai recall", "ai recall" again. Tomorrow, "è che ricchiamo domani". So the whole thing was. "li podire che o chiamato" and "che ricchiamo domani". And I said in response to this, "perfetto, riferisco", "riferisco", is a quite a tricky expression. It basically means "I refer our conversation to that person". So "riferisco", "I'll tell him" or "I'll tell her", "riferisco", but there's no need to say "ai" to him, "it will tell" or anything like that. You can just say, "riferisco". Okay, "è un podificile tutto questo di parlare per telefono, nevero". "Nai faci, ma dai". Oh, there's a lovely expression in Italian, ma dai, dai. Literally means "you give", but how would you translate that in English for a text? Come on, come on, dai, ma dai. Okay, so come on, yeah, it's not that difficult. Hopefully it's not too difficult for all our listeners. One thing that we've not done is look at the whole idea of an informal conversation, but we look at that next time in our next lesson. The fact is when we're using the phone, the chances are we'll be doing something fairly formal to begin with, like, as I said earlier, booking a restaurant or booking a hotel room or finding out information and so on. So, a formal conversation is quite a useful thing to do. Okay, before we finish today's episode, what we'd like to do is return to Francesco for a little bit of culture. It's time for our "cafè cultureale". Va bene. Questa settimana parliamo di opera. The word opera in Italian actually means work, but of course it's also the word that is used to refer to performances which tell stories through music and songs. At traverso muzica e canzoni, even if you're not an opera fan, you will probably have heard of Labo M and Madame Butterfly, which were both written by Jacomo Puccini and are, of course, performed in Italian. And definitely we can't talk about Italian opera without mentioning Giuseppe Verdi, who composed Nabucco, Rigoletto, Il Trovatore and many more. One very famous Italian tenor was Luciano Pavarotti, who was well known for his rendition of Nesun Dorma, which features in another of Puccini's operas called Turandò. Nesun Dorma translates into English as "nan-shala sleep", and you should recognize the word "dorma" from the verb "dormire". An altro tenore italiano molto famoso, another very famous Italian tenor, is Andrea Boccelli. Boccelli recordings include both opera and popular music and one of his most popular songs is "Conte partiro". I thought it would be a good idea to go through a few lines of the chorus of this song and translate them for you. Mark, do you want to help me? Posso aiutare, certo? Allora, "Conte partiro". With you, I will leave. Paesi che non ho mai veduto e vissuto con te. This is interesting because we saw "o chiamato", or "gi, I have cold". This is now "o veduto", I have sin, evisuto and lived. Countries that I have never seen or lived with you. Adesso sì, li vivrò. No, yes, I will live them or I will experience them. Conte partiro, su navi per mari. With you, I will leave on ships across the seas. E io lo so, no, no, no, no, nesisten o più. Which I know no longer exist. Conte io li vivrò. With you, I will love them. Ah, che bellacan soine. Si, è bellissima! E io lo so, non ho nesisto no più. Conte io li vivrò. Paesi che non ho nesisten o più. I am thinking here as we are recording this, that we have a group of opera students who are using a coffee-break Italian and they will be cringing it by opera singing there. So I apologize to all of you. Ma dai! Ok, well that is fortunately all we have got time for in this episode of "Coffee Break Italian". Well that is all for another episode of "Coffee Break Italian". We hope that you've enjoyed this episode and do let us know if you've ever had the chance to have a phone call in Italian and let us know how it went to. You can of course do that. On Facebook at our Facebook page, facebook.com/CoffeeBreak Italian. Or indeed on Twitter. Of course, at Learner Italian. Ok, we'll be back again soon with more coffee-break Italian next time we'll be doing a little more phone calls but we'll also be looking at talking more about ourselves, not ourselves as in the three of us but learning how to talk about yourself so that you can make more friends in Italy and practice your Italian with them. E tutto be raggi, grazie molete! Grazie a tutti, ciao! Adi vedeti! [Music] This is the production of the Radio Lingua Network. Find out more at radiolingua.com