Download Conversational Italian for Travelers Just the Important Phrases with Restaurant Vocabulary and Idiomatic Expressions English and Italian Edition Kathryn Occhipinti 9780990383420 Books

Product details Paperback 96 pages Publisher Stella Lucente, LLC; Bilingual edition (October 25, 2014) Language English, Italian ISBN-10 0990383423

Conversational Italian for Travelers Just the Important Phrases with Restaurant Vocabulary and Idiomatic Expressions English and Italian Edition Kathryn Occhipinti 9780990383420 Books Reviews

• He seems to like it. It arrived on time, and brand new. Using it to learn more before his next trip. He already has a basic understanding of Italian.
• Helped but my husband found a language APP that was much better.
• Great item.
• Travelling to a foreign country can be a terrible experience if you don’t know how to communicate. Kathryn thus solved this potential problem for all foreign visitors to Italy with her book picking on just the important phrases.
  To start with, the book is both exciting and humorous. The reader discovers the Italian alphabethas 21 letters and borrows some additions from Latin. There are surprising differences from English, like z becomes zeta and is pronounced zeh-tah. I spent some time translating my name and found the result amusing. Learning to pronounce the words correctly was an enjoyable experiment in which I found myself closer and closer to sounding very foreign and learned. I discovered “buongiorno” is all I need to say from morning to early evening, and if I am not yet in my hotel then “buonasera” will do until bedtime. For hi and bye to friends there is just one word to learn – “ciao”, but there are so many ways to say goodbye you really have to take your time to learn them. “Millie Gracie” means thanks a lot (a thousand) though I expected it to be “thanks a million”.
  The writer takes the reader through the basic everyday conversational Italian in an interesting manner. You learn to be polite and formal and at the same time to be friendly and appreciative of any assistance. You also learn how to form important phrases, how to ask for the important things and making friends. The book teaches you to get comfortable at the hotel, at a restaurant and when sightseeing. It is indeed a comprehensive guide I would recommend to anyone travelling to Italy who does not speak Italian.
  As for me if someone says “Parla italiano?” (Do you speak Italian?), I will just say “Si, un po’” (Yes, a little) even though sono di Zimbabwe (I am from Zimbabwe).
  Si, I loved this book.
• Well organized. Easy to understand. Told in an interesting way. Freed from the burden of memorizing rules, we start with pronunciation and learn the important expressions for traveling, sightseeing, and shopping. Tips involve polite or informal usage. That may seem hard to digest, but to the reader's relief familiar words and phrases from movies, books, and songs, give comforting moments of aha. And if you have some knowledge of other Romance languages, it's interesting to see the similarities. We also find words Italians adopted from English or English speakers adopted from Italian. In the last two sections of the booklet the author shows us why we may want to visit Italy, to find friendship, romance, or great dining. I had to smile over useful sentences, such as "Can I buy you a drink?" to "Take a hike." My smile broadened where the author left us with a great list of foods, some of them familiar, such as spaghetti, tortellini, ragu, calamari... With that, your appetite is awakened, and Italy beckons. Minor confusion calls for clarification on some of the reflexive verb and pronoun usage. Otherwise, here is a handy booklet of important expressions you can carry in your pocket.
• ** I received this book directly from the author in exchange for my review and because I once lived in Italy **
  
  This is awesome and so much easier to use than the dictionary. When I was stationed in Italy with the Air Force (YEARS ago), I took 6 months of Italian. It wasn’t enough to make me fluent but it was enough to get me started with my landlady, and the butcher, and the church downtown where I lived…and the more I tried, the more they tried to speak English and together we learned. It was the most wonderful three years because the people knew I was trying to blend in and they helped and tolerated me while I learned. Even the butcher would say, “what is this?” in Italian and point to things. I learned. He laughed. Then he practiced English while wrapping my meat. Stuff like that counts. All this to say that a book like this is so welcome and necessary and can make the difference when you travel. People appreciate when you try to speak with them in their language (unless you are French. haha).
  
  This books is much easier to use than some pocket dictionary, which is cumbersome and thick. This truly fits in your pocket is simple to understand, easy to follow, easier to look something up. Need info for ordering dinner? How about shopping? Making a phone call? At a hotel? Easy! There's even a down-and-dirty pronunciation guide. Wish I had it when I started learning the language.
  
  If you are headed overseas, do get this. It is worth the money and yours will be dog-eared in no time. Brava!
• I love Italy the wonderful and free flowing food, loud and welcoming people, gelato and Limoncello, the colors and brightness of everything… and I wish I had this book to read when I went there last. This is a handy guide for a short stay in the country and perhaps even for the student or professional on a study/ work break.
  
  The phrase book is segregated into nifty sections basics, transportation, city life, at the hotel, restaurant… just the most important phrases to navigate through them. One wonders though at how useful this can be to carry around, and I believe a brief of top 50 commonly used phrases at the beginning of the book might have been useful. A dictionary at the end with 500 or so most used words also would have been helpful.
  The problem with phrase book is that you can either memorize the book (quite impossible) or carry them around for ready reference. But you cannot really be standing waiting to buy a ticket and frantically navigate through a book.
  
  Still, I think this book is useful and given it is inexpensive, is worth a buy if you’re travelling to Italy. It delivers what it promises.
  
  Note I received a free copy of this book in exchange for an honest, non-reciprocal review.