La Bella Lingua

I read Dianne Hales' book, La Bella Lingua, some time after coming back from Europe, possibly around December last year, because I can't find it on my monthly reading lists that I've been keeping here since January. It's a fabulous book about the history of the Italian language - how it evolved into the expressive, evocative language it is today, alongside what eventually became the Italian nation.

My attention was drawn to it again today through a mention on a travel forum I frequent, and there was mention made of a connected website, so naturally I had to take a look. It's only been a brief visit so far, but I skipped over to her blog, and I love the way she's set it out, focussing on phrases relevant to a single subject in each post. Such a natural way to learn a language!

It's interesting, and makes a lot more sense than labouring over  the technicalities of a language, when all you really want to do is communicate. No matter how many Italian lessons I might take, and how word perfect I might become (hah!), I would never pass for a native Italian, and nor do I necessarily want to. But I do want to be able to visit and be able to talk to people, whether it's in a shop or with someone at the next table at dinner.

So I have bookmarked Dianne's blog, and will be a frequent visitor, as I count down the days to my next trip.

k is for ...

K is for key (la chiave), kidney (il rene), Komodo dragon (a dragon = il drago, and a lizard = la lucertola), kangaroo (il canguro) and keyboard (la tastiera) .

j is for ...

J is for Jupiter, jerboa and jacaranda. And j is for a jigsaw and the Jolly Roger. The only one I have a translation for is jigsaw = il puzzle.

I do, however, know that the Temple of Jupiter Optimus Maximus (obviously a pretty important god!) was the largest and most important temple in ancient Rome, and was built on the Capitoline hill. The Temple was burnt down and rebuilt three times, and what's left of the foundations are now part of the Capitoline Museums.

i is for ...

I is for ice cream (il gelato), igloo (not in my dictionary, but babelfish tells me it's iglu) and iguana (according to babelfish, the same in English and Italian).

Mmmmm ... gelato. Apparently San Crispino in Rome is supposed to make marvellous gelato, and Giolitti has been making gelato since 1900. Fior di Luna in Trastevere  uses organic and fairtrade ingredients. Two weeks in Rome - how many can we try?

h is for ...

H is for house (la casa), or home - where the heart (il cuore) is. H is for hippo (l'ippopotamo) and hockey (l'hockey) stick (il bastone).

g is for ...

G is for guitar (la chitarra), golf clubs (one gold club is una mazza da golf), the Grim Reaper (death = la morte), and a giraffe (la giraffa).

f is for ...

F is for feet (i piedi), frog (la rana), fish (il pesce) and fruit (la frutta, and fruit salad = macedonia).

e is for ...

E is for elephant (l'elefante), eyes (l'occhio) and an egg (l'uovo). E is for the Eiffel Tower (tower = la torre), and that squiggly thing - the Ebola virus (il virus).

d is for ...

D is for dragon (il drago), dinosaur (il dinosauro), diamond (il diamante) and daisy (la margherita).

I didn't manage to draw yesterday, between work, school Board, the school P&C AGM and the general meeting that followed, so there's another post  to follow ...

c is for ...

C is for car (Susana - it's supposed to be an Audi TT coupe - just for you!), cow and chicken. And C is for a celtic cross, all tied up in knots (hopefully I can fix this at some stage - I love celtic knots, but I'm so tired it's beyond me tonight.

car =  la macchina or l'automobile
cow = la mucca
chicken = il pollo

cross = la croce
knot = il nodo
tired = stanco

I almost didn't do a drawing tonight, and what I did is a bit dodgy (the curve on that lower case c is awful, quite apart from the knots), but now it's done I'm glad I perservered. D day tomorrow ;)

B is for ...

B is for bat (the type that flies - il pipistrello), and bath (la vasca da bagno), and ball (la palla), another type of bat (the type for games - la mazza), and bagpipes (la cornamusa).

Heh - I could put out an ABC book at the end of this ;)

A is for ...

A is for aeroplane (l'aeroplano), and aardvark and apple (la mela). A is for ant (la formica) and aqueduct, with many arches (l'arcata).

I was thinking about what to draw this morning, and eventually came up with the idea of starting at the beginning - gives me plenty of material for the rest of the month, no?

And just a note about the drawings on this blog: the quality isn't terribly good, because they're photographs of the drawings, and they're taken in not particularly bright compact fluorescent light. So apologies for the quality, but for now the important thing is that I'm drawing again. One day I might get around to scanning them properly and replacing them here. Maybe.

quick! draw something!

I've been leaving the drawing until the end of the day, often late at night, and then just doing something quickly. Which is all very well, but now I'm starting to get back into the habit, perhaps I need to put a little more thought and effort into it.

It's the weekend, so there's really no excuse not to do something in morning tomorrow ...

quickly = velocemente
weekend = il fine settimana
Saturday = il sabato
Sunday = la domenica
morning = la mattina
afternoon = il pomeriggio
night = la notte
tomorrow = domani

she draws sea shells

I fell asleep while watching a DVD last night, and the husband insisted I should go to bed instead of messing around on the internet, so here's a sea shell to make up ...

sea = il mare
seafood = i frutti di mare (fruits of the sea)
shell = la conchiglia

line drawing

Ok - tried something different today. Not sure of the result, but it's the technique that is interested. I drew my camera with one continuous line - and some back-tracking:

Camera = la macchina fotographica

La camera = a room!

In case you can't tell, it's a rosebud.

And the only Italian you'll get from me right now is: ho di nuova mal di testa (I've got a headache again).

straight to the point

Le forbici (scissors).

Affiliato (sharp).

Tagliare (to cut).

growing your own

The husband is into hydroponics. The edible kind - tomatoes, strawberries and so on. It's been a few years since he's had a hydroponic system set up, but he became enthused again this summer and planted tomatoes, which grew so large he had to tie them to the gutters to get them up off the ground - the 6' tomato stakes just couldn't cope!

We've had very odd weather - droughts and flooding rains - and by all accounts it's been a difficult season for vegetables in general, and tomatoes in particular, but these ones have masses of fruit still ripening, and fortunately not all at once.

 

Il pomodori - for pizza, salsa (sauce) and insalata (salad). And the homegrown ones are SO much better than anything you can buy in il supermercato (a supermarket).

a rose by any other name

 

La rosa!

We have a variety of roses in our giardino (garden), many of which were here when we bought la casa (the house). I have a bit of il sogno (a dream) to turn much of the yard to food production, and we've added quite a few fruit trees (including several olivo - olive trees, limone e arancia - lemon and orange trees, and others) to the established pera (pear), and mela (apple) trees. 

But whatever we do, la rosa will stay:

Hearts starve as well as bodies; give us bread, but give us roses!

James Oppenheim, Bread and Roses

who's a pretty boy?

One of the sulphur-crested cockatoos that are currently raiding the berries from a neighbour's tree:

I don't know if there's an Italian word for cockatoo, so let's go with l'uccello (bird). He's sitting in the top of l'albero (a tree), snipping off twigs with his sharp becco (beak). He's mostly bianco (white), with a striking gallio (yellow) crest. And he's just bello (beautiful)!