I am so shocked! I am reading a very interesting book which title is “L’ italiano e’ bello” (Italian is nice) by Mariangela Galatea Vaglio and throughout the lecture which explains a lot of Italian history, culture and of course language, I read this:
What do they say/do?
When we Italians listen to someone who is explaining something we don’t understand, we say: “They are speaking Arabic!”; Spanish say: “They are speaking Chinese!”; Brazilians, Norwegians and English say: “They are speaking Greek!/This is Greek to me!”. It is curious right? Each of these three languages is complicated grammatically and culturally, they are three different worlds. Continue reading “What do they say/do?”
Norwegian style!
5 years in this beautiful country, 5 years living in a completely different culture, trying to integrate myself to this society… Norway or No way?
I read a very interesting book in May which title is The social guidebook to Norway by Julien S. Bourrelle: the funniest thing is that I was told to read it by a brazilian friend of mine who lives in Germany, but as she has been in Norway for holidays, she bought it and since she knows I live here, she suggested for me to read it. To be honest it was the first time me hearing of such a book, even though I have been living in Norway for so long now, but anyway, I visited her and I read this book in half an hour!
“Qué bolá asere?”
Today I would like to talk about a beautiful island, that stole my heart many years ago, with its beautiful people, culture and of course language:
Cuba, la isla bonita, as Madonna sings!
Cubans theoretically speak Spanish but they also have a proper slang, which from my point of view it can’t be considered as dialect, but just a different way to speak the native language!
“Tu vuó fá l´ammericano!”
Do you know what this title means? First of all, it belongs to an old and very popular song written by Renato Carosone, but it has been rearranged today becoming so popular that you can dance it all over the world!
That sentence means: “You act like an american/ You wanna be an american” and it refers to all those emigrants who from Italy, especially from Naples as the song says, moved to United States and when they happen to travel back to their homeland for holidays for example, they act like “big shot” americans who have it all, when in reality they have nothing.
“Sono un italiano, un italiano vero!”
Who doesn´t love this beautiful, elegant language?
Everywhere I go and whenever I say that I am Italian, I always receive from others an outstanding feedback of admiration both for my beautiful country and for my beautiful language. L´italiano is a complex, elegant language, full of rules and exceptions: not just because of its grammar, but mostly for the millions expressions and terms, the tone and the several dialects it has. Concerning the dialects it is very important to know that they were born from latin and one of them , the Tuscan dialect, denominated the vulgar language, gave birth to our national language: Italiano.
What is typical?
Here I am today to write a short list of typical cultural factors of the countries whose languages I speak:
I am a curious person and I always try to discover and learn new things; I can tell you that lately I have taken the B2 level norwegian exam and one of the most popular questions is “What is typical in Norway?“, so then I asked myself: “And what about Italy, Spain, Latin America, United Kingdom, USA, Canada, Australia, Portugal and Brazil?“. So I have been asking all my friends who belong to these cultures and I found out that (I chose the most important 5 typical things):
