Parlo poco italiano

Ciao miei amici,

I had an amazing break through, (well I think it is) it was only a small break through, but I came away feeling slightly flushed and very proud of myself. While I was at work at the scola reception, being my cheery bubbly self welcoming all our foot traffic to the school. A man name Domenico came through the doors to meet our PE teacher, I thought, with a name like Domenico he must be spanish or something, so I asked if he was, and he was like no, I’m italian. I had been saying to myself next opportunity I have to speak to a italian stranger I will leap at it, so here was that opportunity. I was like Parla italiano, he was like si si, so I said parlo poco italiano, and I got a big ahhhhh so I replied il mio ragazzo e italiano, and then he asked where I was from, so I replied with my generic nouva zelanda, then I got a bit confused, with something about PE teachers and New Zealand and then they all come back, or maybe it was that New Zealand PE teachers come over here to the UK, but always end of going home. It was all a bit over my head, but I got the general gist. 

As he was leaving, I was like Ciao Domenico! and has he was walking out the door he yelled out to Sean our PE teacher (also a fellow kiwi) “This girl can speak italian!” 

You can not understand how proud I felt hearing that from an ITALIAN! Because I’m doing this italian course with mango languages and while I’m finding it great, and I can translate every single thing for passport journey one from english to italian, I still don’t feel like it’s sinking in properly. But just hearing from an italian that isn’t my boyfriend, makes me feel like, wow I’m actually getting somewhere with this. 

I mean there are a few italian speakers floating around at work, but after the routine ciao‘s and come stai‘s I just get a bit lost with what more to say. But I thought in my head that if I met an italian stranger I could actually have a short little 5 minute conversation, and well today just proved that to myself! 

And I love seeing how far I have actually come, when I show my friends what I’m learning, or say just italian ramble, they have no idea what I’m saying, or if I show them a short piece of literature, it makes complete sense to me now, and just looks like gibberish to them. So this whole italian thing, is actually slowly coming together, and for once I couldn’t be prouder of myself! 

Mio bella roma e gennaio 2013!