Italian All-in-One For Dummies (4 page)

tiramisù
(tee-rah-mee-
sooh
) (Literally:
pull me up,
a reference to the fact that this sweet is made with Italian espresso)

You may have heard words from areas other than the kitchen, too, such as the following:

amore
(ah-
moh
-reh): This is the word
love
that so many Italian songs tell about.

avanti
(ah-
vahn
-tee): You use this word to mean
Come in!
It can also mean
Come on!
or
Get a move on!

bambino
(bahm-
bee
-noh): This is a male child. The female equivalent is
bambina
(bahm-
bee
-nah).

bravo!
(
brah
-voh!): You can properly say this word only to one man. To a woman, you must say
brava!
(
brah
-vah!), and to a group of people, you say
bravi!
(
brah
-vee!) unless the group is composed only of women, in which case you say
brave!
(
brah
-veh!).

ciao!
(chou!):
Ciao
means
hello
and
goodbye.
Ciao
comes from the Venetian expression
sciào vostro,
or
schiavo vostro
(
skyah
-voh
voh
-stroh) (
[I am]
your
slave
) in Italian; servants used this phrase in the 18th century when they addressed their lords.

scusi
(
skooh
-zee): This word stands for
excuse me
and
sorry
and is addressed to persons you don't know or to whom you speak formally. You say
scusa
(
scooh
-zah) to people you know and to children.

Getting to the root of cognates

In addition to the words that have crept into the language directly, Italian and English have many cognates. A
cognate
is a word in one language that has the same origin as a word in another one and may sound similar. You can get an immediate picture of what cognates are from the following examples:

aeroporto
(ah-eh-roh-
pohr
-toh) (
airport
)

attenzione
(aht-tehn-
tsyoh
-neh) (
attention
)

comunicazione
(koh-mooh-nee-kah-
tsyoh
-neh) (
communication
)

importante
(eem-pohr-
tahn
-teh) (
important
)

incredibile
(een-kreh-
dee
-bee-leh) (
incredible
)