One (older) man’s quest to learn Italian – Part 5

Even after using all of these materials, there is still something missing from one’s study of Italian: conversation. I’ve found several ways to solve this problem.

First, and certainly best, is to spend time in Italy and use the language. Since contracting to buy an apartment there last August, I’ve been back 4 times for a week at a time. The opportunity to use the language was bountiful, since I was checking on reconstruction, attending the closing, ordering an apartment’s worth of furniture, and constructing that furniture as well as buying the items necessary to make the place livable. This also gives one the opportunity to learn things the way Italians use them in everyday life.

But, I can’t continue these once every month or two trips … at least not right now (he says with a smile, thinking about the future and spending more time there).

So, I focused on getting more conversation here in the US.

I have a good friend, my best man, who has fallen for Italy almost as much as I have. He’s studying the language, and we do practice speaking and writing to one another. He lives 2 hours away, so this is not an ideal solution.

I also found an Italian “Meet Up” group here in central Ohio, and have joined that. See:

http://www.meetup.com/

Search for “Italian” and your city, and you might be amazed just how many other Italian students there are!

Finally, and I’ve left the best for last, find a native Italian speaker and hire them as a personal tutor.

After being frustrated with not being able to attend regular university or college classes in Italian, I sent an e-mail to the head of the Italian program at Ohio State University asking for her advice. She suggested the tutor route, and had a department administrator provide me a list of tutors. She stressed that I should only get one who is a NATIVE Italian speaker. I made my calls and sent my e-mails, and have been using a tutor for several months. The ability to converse weekly, ask questions, be tested on progress, and cover more complex sentence structures, tenses, etc., has been nothing short of fabulous.

My best man has done exactly the same thing, and he feels as I do, “Why didn’t I do this sooner?” For what is likely to be less than $30 each week, you can get an hour or two of great one-on-one help with your Italian, and help out a “starving student”. The tutors we use or who we contacted are all Italian citizens here doing either another undergraduate degree, or advanced degrees, after earning a degree in Italy. None of them teaches Italian at their university here. They are studying in areas like women’s studies or very advanced philosophy (doctorate level). We find that their ability to provide more information to us than just rote lesson material is fantastic … plus, our interest in all things Italian makes them feel much more at home here in the US, and provides a bit of a connection for them with things at home. In addition to having tutors, we both believe we’ve now made a few more life friends who are Italian.

One last word of advice before I close this series:

Don’t fall for the “Learn a language in 10 days!” advertisements you see on the Internet. Learning a new language takes time and commitment. If you do not study regularly (several times a week), and with tenacity, forget learning much Italian. If you fall away from studying, get back on track as soon as you can and start again. You'll stumble along the way, so be prepared to get up, dust yourself off, and start back at it when your motivation returns. It will not be a straight line of progress. But, start now, do a little bit every day or every other day, be committed and be tenacious, don’t give up, and you’ll be rewarded every day along the way with steady progress that you can use on your next trip to Italy!

Buona fortuna & buon viaggio!

Ciao … Marco

http://www.italianrealestateassist.com

One (older) man’s quest to learn Italian – Part 4

Once you’ve mastered the readily available audio lessons (like Pimsleur and “Learn In Your Car”), you’ll still feel that you’ve only scratched the surface of the Italian language. In reality, you’ve probably learned 70% (by volume … vocabulary, verb conjugation, etc.) of what you need to communicate well. It’s just that the other 30%, although a much smaller volume, is the most difficult material and concepts.

I was somewhat stymied at this point. I still had not found good classes or formal classroom instruction that worked with my schedule.

I came to the realization that it would now require (much?) more work on my part, and my style of learning would need to change. Before this, my preferred learning style was audio – cassettes and CDs. Now, it would have to be more visual … primarily reading and memorizing from books. Before you cringe too badly, I did find a way out of this conundrum, but we’ll discuss that in Part 5 of this series.

Here are some resources I found very helpful at this point:

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501 Italian Verbs, Barron’s, John Colaneri and Vincent Luciani
This is a great resource for learning more infinitives, verbs, gerunds, and verb conjugations.

Webster’s New World Italian Dictionary
What more can I say?

NTC’s Beginner’s Italian and English Dictionary
A different kind of dictionary as it has only about 3,500 of the most commonly used words, and then uses them in context, in an Italian sentence, WITH ENGLISH TRANSLATION. This is a wonderful resource.

Italian Verbs and Essential Grammar, Passport Books, Carlo Graziano
This is a very concise grammar text, explaining every aspect of Italian grammar. I’ve seen others that are just as good. In fact, my take is that the grammar books are all very similar. You need to buy one, any one, and use it. It is probably the most important text you can have for seriously studying Italian.

Mastering Italian Vocabulary (a thematic approach), Barron’s, Luciana Feiner-Torriani and Gunter H. Klemm
This is, in my mind, another “must have” book. Like the NTC dictionary, this book takes 5,128 of the most used Italian words, and categorizes them around themes (i.e. sports, health, food, work, etc.). There are sections within each category of the easier and most used words, as well as sections within each category for the harder, more commonly-used words. Each word is used, in context, with the English translation. A fabulous resource.

Ultimate Italian (advanced), Living Language
This is a more advanced cassette or CD learning tool. It has more short narrative pieces or “acts” that are also transcribed and translated in the accompanying text. It is work to get through this material, but that’s because it’s much more advanced. This is one of the better “advanced” audio learning tools I have seen, but unlike Pimsleur and “Learn In Your Car”, you need to use the text with the cassettes or CDs or it’s not very instructive. Not a good tool to use while driving, or exercising, for example.

Acquerello Italiano, Champs-Elysees
This is a series of contemporary audio “magazines” (cassette or CD), issued on a regular basis in subscription format, that have printed learning materials provided along with the audio media. Like Ultimate Italian, this takes work, and while you can listen to the audio alone (like in your car), it’s a better tool to use if you use both the audio and the written material.

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You can also go to any half-price, or used book store and find many great Italian texts, dictionaries, and audio sets for very little cost. I’ve purchased some short story or novellas that have Italian on one page, and the English translation on the facing page. These require work to get through … but with time … will greatly improve your advanced Italian language skills.

Next entry, the final entry in this series (thank goodness, right?), where I am now …

One (older) man’s quest to learn Italian – Part 3

Upon return from Italy in the summer of 2000, I worked to complete Level III of the Pimsleur series. At the same time, I did more research and found a CD series called “Learn In Your Car” … Italian. I purchased this. It is a set of 9 CDs … 3 each for their Levels 1, 2, and 3. This series is different than the Pimsleur series. It takes what I feel is a more traditional approach to teaching languages … lots of lessons are purely conjugating verbs, but at least they are in a functional, useable, learnable (I think that’s a made up word, sorry!) format. As well, this series goes into much more difficult uses of pronouns (direct and indirect), reflexive verbs, etc. Also, much more vocabulary … including many new verbs or verb infinitives.

I must admit that even today, after about 5 years of study (that’s 5 years on and off I might add … not full time over 5 years), I’m still not completely finished with all of Level 3 of “Learn In Your Car”. There are a number of lessons that I continue to listen to on a regular basis. I have pretty much learned all of the vocabulary on all 9 CDs … it’s just some pronoun use and some of the more complex sentence structures that I’ve still not mastered. Most are not that commonly used in everyday Italian, so I don’t get much practice with them when in Italy either.

So, “Learn In Your Car” is a great resource to further expand your grasp of Italian, and is priced very nicely. I believe I purchased it through Amazon for about $40 plus shipping.

Caution! This set is also sold “broken up” … something like what Pimsleur does. I would advise saving the money (and making the personal commitment) and buying the complete 3-level set … not each set one-by-one.

In my next entry in this series, I’ll share some of the other resources I’ve found to further your self-study of Italian and do more advanced learning.

One (older) man’s quest to learn Italian – Part 2

Once I got to the end of the Pimsleur cassettes I had borrowed from the library, I realized that I had used what I refer to as a “sampler” package from Pimsleur. The full-blown Pimsleur language learning series are sets of 3 levels (Levels I, II, and III), and contain, if my memory serves me, 30 lessons in each series that are … about … 30 minutes long. This means that each set or level of a series contains about 15 hours of language training. Not the 4 or 8 tape sets of 4 or 8 hours in duration total.

These Pimsleur language series were not available at my library (they may be at yours!), so I purchased the first level, Level I, on e-Bay. I did the same for Level II and Level III as well. I never paid more than $200 for a Level. For Level I, I purchased the cassette series. For Level II and Level III, I purchased the CD series. They are exactly the same content … just different media (CD vs. cassette).

I had about 6 months between the time I received my first Pimsleur set and the time I would leave for Italy. I became serious about learning Italian, and used the series every second I could. I used the cassettes for Level I while showering and shaving, while in the car, while exercising (distance running), while traveling (on airlines), and any time I had “down time” when I could study for even a few minutes (doctor or dentist waiting room, middle of the night when I couldn’t sleep, etc.).

I followed the advice of the Pimsleur method of learning, and repeated each lesson until I “got” about 80% of the material. This meant I had to listen to each lesson 5 to 10 times, depending on the intensity and the complexity of the material in a specific lesson. This means I had to devote 2 and a half to 5 hours to each lesson, or 75 to 150 hours for one level of the series. As I write this and think back on that time, I’m pretty sure that more lessons were repeated 10 times than those repeated only 5 times, so the actual time spent for the series was likely much closer to 150 hours than 75.

The Pimsleur method of language learning uses phrases that continually build on one another to teach one how to speak and understand the language. It does not do a great job of teaching one how to read, or write. It is focused on verbal communication. Since this was my objective, it was perfect for me. It might not be for you if your objective of learning Italian is different than mine.

I managed to get fully through Levels I & II as well as through Level III at about 50% accomplishment before I left for Italy. When there, I was 100% able to communicate, in Italian, to get anywhere, do anything, and find anything we needed. It was a freeing experience … to be able to move around in a foreign country and not depend on anyone speaking English. I did find that my Italian was not good enough to carry on anything more than a very basic conversation … that I needed much more learning and practice, and much more vocabulary. But, it was clear that Pimsleur worked, and that spending time focused on completing Level III on return to the US would get me another large step closer to being proficient enough to converse in Italian.

For $600 or less (3 sets of Pimsleur lesson for $200 or less each), I had gotten a long way fast.

In my next entry in this series, I’ll share what I did when I returned from Italy because there is an interesting challenge that completing Level III presents.

One (older) man’s quest to learn Italian – Part 1

There is no better way to fit in, rather than stand out, than to learn the native language of the places one visits. I went to Italy for the first time in 1996. I went to a small town called Fano … a beach town actually … on the Adriatic coast. Our family went there because my best friend was born there and still has family there. He immigrated to Canada at age 5, so he’s more North American than Italian, but he speaks fluent Italian. The town, even now, does not have anywhere near the percentage of people who speak English as … let’s say … Rome or Milan. Thus, we spent that two weeks during the hot summer of 1996 having my friend be our guide and translator. Reflecting on the trip afterwards … and it was a fabulous trip … the only disappointment for me was my inability to communicate with the people … it all happened through a translator.

I vowed that I would not go back until I learned the language. But, for almost 4 years I did nothing about it.

Well, that’s not entirely true. I did immediately buy the first Berlitz cassette series for Italian. It was 6 or 8 tapes and a book. It was just “OK”. I didn’t feel there was enough structure or purpose to it, and quickly lost interest. So, for about 3 (or 3 and a half) years I just dropped the thought of learning Italian.

In late 1999, we started planning a return trip to Italy … Rome, Tuscany, and Lake Como. I remembered my vow to myself. The impetus for making this commitment was simple. Like many, I took foreign language classes in middle school (Russian) and high school (French). I hated every minute … did the minimum needed to get the grade I wanted … and learned … really learned … just about nothing. It’s the old story of, “… if I knew THEN what I know NOW …”

I wanted to make up for that wasted time and thought learning a new language at 42-years-old would be an accomplishment as well as a way to fit in when returning to Italy.

I first started by researching Italian lessons or classes. It was clear that Columbus, Ohio is not a hotbed of Italian language learning. The only good option I could find was Italian classes … part of the normal curriculum … at Ohio State University. Of course, the classes were day classes that started at 10:00 AM five days a week, and thus not a viable option for me.

I went to the library and checked out every text, cassette, and CD series I could find. I tried them all, and found the Pimsleur series to be the best … for me (maybe not for you).

I used the 4 or 8 cassettes and got through them fairly quickly, and really felt they gave one a good base in terms of verb conjugation, without the learning process being rote memorization of conjugation tables.

To Be Continued …

CONTRAST: US vs. ITALY Outbound Travel …

Here’s some more food for thought about the miniscule 3.33% of US residents (note, this is NOT the percentage of US citizens and thus includes recent immigrants to the US who are green card or visa holders) who travel abroad by air every year.

Since this blog is focused on Italy, let’s look at a comparison between outbound travel from the US and from Italy. The statistics are very revealing.

This link to the US Commercial Service, United States of America Department of Commerce web site:

http://www.buyusa.gov/italy/en/312.pdf

… is a briefing document (almost like a press release actually) on Italian tourism. In it a statistic is quoted that, “One out of six adult Italians travel abroad each year …”

This means that 16.67% of adult Italians travel abroad every year versus 3.33% of Americans. FIVE TIMES as many Italians leave Italy for foreign lands as do Americans! FIVE TIMES!

I’ll still save some time in the future for my more in-depth editorial comments on these numbers, but it’s clear to me why we have the reputation we do overseas as often being rude, loud, abrasive, demanding, inflexible, and much too willing to talk and not listen. While these are symptoms of rudeness, my feeling is that the problem is one that’s more grounded in ignorance … it’s a lack of education, understanding, and experience.

More on this topic in future entries.

Ciao … Mark

http://www.italianrealestateassist.com

Insularity breeds (possible) ignorance & rudeness …

Anyone who has read my blog entries knows I’m a rabid supporter of overseas travel for Americans. It’s a "mind-expanding" experience … assuming it’s approached with an open mind willing to learn and assimilate new thoughts, ideas, ways, and attitudes.

It’s unfortunate that more Americans do not travel abroad. I’ve been doing Internet research on the statistics for travel abroad by US citizens. Here is a great summary of what I’ve found:

http://tinet.ita.doc.gov/view/f-2004-101-001/index.html

These are statistics kept by the US Government Office of Travel and Tourism Industries. On the surface, it shows that in 2004 there were 27,351,000 US resident travelers who made trips by air to foreign lands. After a further review of the numbers from the downloaded spreadsheet information available (more detailed than the web page display only), it seems that the 27 million number is actually a trip number, not the actual number of US residents who traveled abroad in the year. The statistics show a mean (or average) of 2.8 trips per year for each person who traveled and was included in these statistics. This means that the same person taking 3 trips counted as 3 travelers in the 27 million number, even though it was only one person – the same person – doing the traveling.

This would suggest that only 9,768,214 US residents traveled abroad by air in 2004. And, it appears that people that travel to foreign lands by air are a tight bunch – they take, on average, 2.8 trips per year, but also have taken an average of 11 trips to foreign lands over a 5-year period. That’s more than 2 trips each year for each traveler! Thus, lots of repeat travelers … business travelers much more so than personal travelers.

Conclusion? On a percentage basis, very few people in the US get any “on the ground” exposure to foreign countries, cultures, or people.

With an estimated 2004 US population of 293 million people, this suggests that only 3.33% of the US populations travels abroad by air in any given year.

And 47% of these trips were taken by US residents living in the Middle Atlantic (includes NY and NJ) and South Atlantic (includes FL) regions, where there are large immigrant and non-citizen populations.

I’ll let you digest these numbers for a while before I do another blog entry on them with more “editorial” comment … meaning my personal conclusions about these statistics. I’m trying to find some statistics on how the US stacks up against other nations with respect to the percentage of the population that travels abroad in a given year.

This may take me quite a few evenings of Google searching. I do have a day job!

:-)

Ciao … Mark
http://www.italianrealestateassist.com

GET OVER IT! There ain’t no free coffee refills!

When traveling, to have the best experiences, I believe one has to try to fit in rather than stand out. Of course no matter how hard one tries to be an American in Italy (or elsewhere outside of the US) and fit in as a local, you’ll always be singled out as a foreigner. The operative words here are TRY TO FIT IN RATHER THAN STAND OUT.

This is, to me, simply a matter of respect and cordiality. Rather than expecting people to change for you, act the part of the guest and change for your host(s).

I watched an exchange in the Munich airport on my return from my last trip to Italy in May. I came on a commuter flight from Ancona, and had a layover of several hours in Munich before my flight to Philadelphia. It was getting near time for lunch, so I grabbed a ham and cheese pastry, a sparkling water, and a beer, and sat down to eat.

Sitting there, I noticed an older American couple enter the café. They spoke to each other about how they wanted the ham and cheese pastry, but then made the service person explain what every pastry in the display was – maybe 20 types – and then they ordered two ham and cheese pastries. From this, I knew I had to watch them more closely because I was certain the material for a blog entry was just around the corner. It was.

The lady spent a considerable time himing and hawing about what she wanted to drink, and just as much time himing and hawing about what type of coffee she wanted once she decided she wanted a coffee. She chose a cappuccino. They then sat right behind me.

First, they started bitching at each other about some irrelevant comment the husband made … she contended he was trying to make fun of her, he contended he was just answering a question she asked. They went back and forth like two bickering 6-year-old kids. I wanted to grab my tray and smack them both upside the head.

Then, the lady finished her coffee and went to the counter and asked for a refill. The service person asked if she would like another coffee … as you know, Europeans are not in the habit of “refilling” used coffee cups but providing a new one ... and for the regular charge. She asked if it was a “free refill”. He responded that there was no such thing as a “free refill” … if she wanted another coffee, she’d have to pay for it ... but he did it very politely. She then proceeded to bitch at him, bitch on the way back to her table, and bitch to her husband once she got there. It was actually pretty funny at this point because she was so lathered up; she was making no sense … kind of in an out-of-control fury.

I was going to say something to her, to help her understand the cultural and practical differences she had just experienced, but I was too tired, and frankly didn’t feel she’d respond too well to my trying to help. She looked and acted like the old dog that wasn’t going to learn any new tricks.

I can almost guarantee she went home and told anyone and everyone who would listen that she was treated poorly and “ripped off” in Munich … which I happen to feel is one of the finer cities in the world.

A shame really, that her inability to adapt, and understand, might possibly encourage someone else not to travel there … just possibly.

Pictures from Day 8, Thursday, May 18, 2006 ...

Pictures from my furniture construction trip Day 8 (Thursday, May 18, 2006) are here:

http://www.italianrealestateassist.com/photo_gallery_rent.htm

With appropriate commentary here from this blog:

http://marcofano.blogspot.com/2006/05/furniture-construction-trip-day-8.html

These are the final pictures from the last day of work.

Back to "normal" blogging after today.

Enjoy!

Ciao ... Mark

Pictures from Day 7, Wednesday, May 17, 2006 ...

Pictures from my furniture construction trip Day 7 (Wednesday, May 17, 2006) are here:

http://www.italianrealestateassist.com/day_seven_pix.htm

With appropriate commentary here from this blog:

http://marcofano.blogspot.com/2006/05/furniture-construction-trip-day-7.html

Errand, market, and meeting day.

Enjoy!

Ciao ... Mark

Pictures from Day 6, Tuesday, May 16, 2006 ...

Pictures from my furniture construction trip Day 6 (Tuesday, May 16, 2006) are here:

http://www.italianrealestateassist.com/day_six_pix.htm

With appropriate commentary here from this blog:

http://marcofano.blogspot.com/2006/05/furniture-construction-trip-day-6.html

My favorite day of the week in Fano is Tuesday ... because of dinner with the boys.

Enjoy!

Ciao ... Mark