Learn how to express your desires in Italian using the Italian verb volere
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| INTRODUCTION |
| Marco: Buongiorno! Mi chiamo Cinzia. |
| Cinzia: Marco here. Beginner series, Lesson 15. Buongiorno tutti! |
| Marco: I guess they understood it was a joke. Anyway, Marco here! Beginner Series, Season, Lesson 15 - Expressing Your Desires in Italy! My name is Marco and I’m joined here by our… |
| Cinzia: Say, say it. |
| Marco: Cinzia. |
| Cinzia: Oh my god. |
| Marco: Why, you have another name? |
| Cinzia: Never, never, never one compliment. |
| Marco: Ah, nonsense, okay. |
| Cinzia: Anyway, it didn’t work. The switch didn’t work. Hello and welcome to the beginner series of ItalianPod101.com. |
| Marco: And thanks for joining us for our 15th lesson of this beginner series. |
| Cinzia: Which focuses on the basics for anyone starting to learn the Italian language. |
| Marco: So please join us for Italian comedy - I mean for Italian grammar and language and culture. In this lesson, we will learn how to use volere (to want) in the condizionale tense. |
| Cinzia: This conversation takes place in a bakery. |
| Marco: And it is between Elena and a customer. |
| Cinzia: They will be speaking formal Italian. |
| Marco: I will be the customer, while Cinzia will be Elena. |
| DIALOGUE |
| Elena: Buongiorno signore! Prego? |
| Cliente: Vorrei quattro rosette e dieci grissini. |
| Elena: Altro? |
| Cliente: Um, sì. Prendo anche due pezzi di quella pizza margherita... Sembra buona! |
| Elena: Sì, la nostra pizza è speciale! |
| Cliente: Ah, bene! Quant'è? |
| Elena: Sono 4 euro e cinquanta. |
| Elena: Grazie e buona giornata! |
| Customer: Arrivederci! |
| Marco: Let's hear it slowly now. |
| Cinzia: Ascoltiamolo lentamente. |
| Elena: Buongiorno signore! Prego? |
| Cliente: Vorrei quattro rosette e dieci grissini. |
| Elena: Altro? |
| Cliente: Um, sì. Prendo anche due pezzi di quella pizza margherita... Sembra buona! |
| Elena: Sì, la nostra pizza è speciale! |
| Cliente: Ah, bene! Quant'è? |
| Elena: Sono 4 euro e cinquanta. |
| Elena: Grazie e buona giornata! |
| Customer: Arrivederci! |
| Marco: And now, with the translation. |
| Cinzia: E ora, con la traduzione. |
| Elena: Buongiorno signore! Prego? |
| Elena: Good day, sir. How can I help you? |
| Cliente: Vorrei quattro rosette e dieci grissini. |
| Customer: I would like four rosettes and ten grissini. |
| Elena: Altro? |
| Elena: Anything else? |
| Cliente: Um, sì. Prendo anche due pezzi di quella pizza margherita... Sembra buona! |
| Customer: Um, yes. I will take also two slices of that pizza margherita...it looks delicious! |
| Elena: Sì, la nostra pizza è speciale! |
| Elena: Yes, our pizza is special! |
| Cliente: Ah, bene! Quant'è? |
| Customer: Ah, good! How much is it? |
| Elena: Sono 4 euro e cinquanta. |
| Elena: It's four Euros and fifty. |
| Elena: Grazie e buona giornata! |
| Elena: Thank you. Have a nice day! |
| Customer: Arrivederci! |
| Customer: Goodbye! |
| POST CONVERSATION BANTER |
| Marco: Mm, bakeries. I mean panetteria. |
| Cinzia: Mm, che buono. That make me think about it. Ah, you’re gonna get me hungry. |
| Marco: You can really smell Italian bakeries even from afar, especially in the morning, right, Cinzia? |
| Cinzia: Yes, early morning. |
| Marco: Mm, so maybe from half past seven, but even before, up to maybe 10 a.m. |
| Cinzia: Mm, mm, mm, yes. |
| Marco: So good going in an Italian bakery in the morning, all that hot bread just out of the oven. |
| Cinzia: Mm, and the pizza bianca, which I love. |
| Marco: Pizza bianca? |
| Cinzia: Oh yes, focaccia. |
| Marco: Oh, maybe it’s focaccia. We have to check it out. We don’t have pizza bianca in my region. We call it focaccia, right? |
| Cinzia: Hmm, but in Napoli, we all used to call it even pizza bianca. |
| Marco: Okay, okay. |
| Cinzia: It’s plain, it’s some plain pizza with salt. |
| Marco: Okay. So no tomato sauce on it. |
| Cinzia: No. |
| Marco: Okay. |
| Cinzia: Sometimes, nutella. |
| Marco: Nutella? |
| Cinzia: Oh yes. |
| Marco: How do we translate nutella? |
| Cinzia: Oh, nutella cannot be translated, come on. |
| Marco: It can only be eaten. |
| Cinzia: Yes. |
| Marco: Yes. Let us take a look at today’s vocabulary. |
| VOCAB LIST |
| Marco: First… |
| Cinzia: volere [natural native speed] |
| Marco: to want, to wish, to long, to demand |
| Cinzia: volere [slowly - broken down by syllable] volere [natural native speed] |
| Marco: Next |
| Cinzia: rosetta [natural native speed] |
| Marco: Italian rose shaped dinner rolls (a kind of round bread cut to look like a rose when baked) |
| Cinzia: rosetta [slowly - broken down by syllable] rosetta [natural native speed] |
| Marco: Next |
| Cinzia: grissino [natural native speed] |
| Marco: a kind of hard breadstick |
| Cinzia: grissino [slowly - broken down by syllable] grissino [natural native speed] |
| Marco: Next |
| Cinzia: altro [natural native speed] |
| Marco: another, else |
| Cinzia: altro [slowly - broken down by syllable] altro [natural native speed] |
| Marco: Next |
| Cinzia: prendere [natural native speed] |
| Marco: to take, get, (figuratively) to buy |
| Cinzia: prendere [slowly - broken down by syllable] prendere [natural native speed] |
| Marco: Next |
| Cinzia: pezzi [natural native speed] |
| Marco: pieces, slices |
| Cinzia: pezzi [slowly - broken down by syllable] pezzi [natural native speed] |
| Marco: Next |
| Cinzia: sembrare [natural native speed] |
| Marco: to look like, seem |
| Cinzia: sembrare [slowly - broken down by syllable] sembrare [natural native speed] |
| Marco: Next |
| Cinzia: buona [natural native speed] |
| Marco: good |
| Cinzia: buona [slowly - broken down by syllable] buona [natural native speed] |
| Marco: Next |
| Cinzia: speciale [natural native speed] |
| Marco: special |
| Cinzia: speciale [slowly - broken down by syllable] speciale [natural native speed] |
| Marco: And last, we have an expression… |
| Cinzia: buona giornata [natural native speed] |
| Marco: good morning, good day |
| Cinzia: buona giornata [slowly - broken down by syllable] buona giornata [natural native speed] |
| VOCAB AND PHRASE USAGE |
| Cinzia: How many words today? |
| Marco: Ten. |
| Cinzia: Mm, too many. |
| Marco: Really? No, come on! This is beginner series. We have to get our students to study more and more! |
| Cinzia: Yes, you’re right. Explain the usage of buona giornata. |
| Marco: Well, it’s very similar to buongiorno, right? |
| Cinzia: But what is the difference? |
| Marco: Buona giornata is usually used more as to wish someone to have a good day. |
| Cinzia: So, to someone who’s walking away. |
| Marco: Yes. For example, in today’s dialogue, Elena says buona giornata to the customer because he is going out of the shop. |
| Cinzia: So, it can be together with arrivederci. |
| Marco: Yes! So how do we say that altogether? |
| Cinzia: Arrivederci! Buona giornata! |
| Marco: And in English, that would be… |
| Cinzia: Goodbye! Have a nice day! |
| Marco: Perfect! So someone is leaving for a place, a shop, an office, a restaurant, you might hear - Buona giornata! “Have a good day!” |
| Cinzia: And now, let’s have a look at the usage for some of the words and expressions. The first word we will look at is volere. |
| Marco: So, Cinzia, can you give us one example sentence, please? |
| Cinzia: Vorrei un cappuccino, per favore. |
| Marco: “I’d like a cappuccino, please.” |
| Cinzia: Okay. The next word is altro. |
| Marco: Let’s have an example. |
| Cinzia: Prendo un altro cioccolatino. |
| Marco: “I’ll take another chocolate.” |
| Cinzia: Mm, buoni cioccolatini. |
| Marco: “Mm, chocolates are good.” |
| Cinzia: And the next word is prendere. |
| Marco: One example, please. |
| Cinzia: Prendi le chiavi per favore. |
| Marco: "Get the keys, please." |
| Cinzia: Next word is pezzi. |
| Marco: And the example is… |
| Cinzia: Mangio due pezzi di pane. |
| Marco: "I eat two pieces of bread." |
| Cinzia: Pezzi, what can we say about this word, Marco? Because I use it very often and even for other kinds of food. |
| Marco: True! Now, in this case, it is two pieces of bread in English, right? |
| Cinzia: Yes, due pezzi di pane. |
| Marco: What about due pezzi di pizza? How would you say that in English? |
| Cinzia: I think it could be translated as “two slices of pizza.” |
| Marco: So, pezzi, which is the plural of pezzo, well, the nearest translation is “piece,” but it can also mean “slice.” |
| Cinzia: Yes, exactly. Un pezzo di cioccolato. |
| Marco: “A piece of chocolate.” |
| Cinzia: If you’re eating a chocolate bar. |
| Marco: Yes, true, something that you break out in small pieces, that is. |
| Cinzia: Yes. And what else? |
| Marco: What about un pezzo di formaggio? |
| Cinzia: Oh yes, “a piece of cheese.” |
| Marco: What else? |
| Cinzia: Un pezzo di torta |
| Marco: “A slice of a cake” or “a piece of cake.” I’d use more “slice of a cake,” right? |
| Cinzia: I’d say “a piece of cake,” but we never agree, so nevermind. |
| Marco: Yeah, yeah. |
| Cinzia: Let’s move on. The next word we will see is sembrare. |
| Marco: And the example is… |
| Cinzia: Quegli spaghetti sembrano buoni. |
| Marco: "That spaghetti looks delicious." Okay. |
| Cinzia: The last word for today is speciale. |
| Marco: One last example then. |
| Cinzia: È un'offerta speciale. |
| Marco: “A special offer.” |
| Cinzia: Okay then, this wraps it up for the vocabulary usage. |
| Marco: And now, let’s have a look at the grammar point. |
| Cinzia: Mm, boring. |
Lesson focus |
|---|
| Cinzia: Volere “to want” in the condizionale or "conditional tense" can be translated as "would like" in English. |
| Marco: And it is used to express desires, and these desires can be real or actually dreamed. |
| Cinzia: Yes. For example - Ahhh vorrei una casa al mare. |
| Marco: "Ahhh I'd like a house by the sea." Nice. Now, one more usage of vorrei is when you are in restaurants or cafes or in any situation when you are ordering something, because it’s a polite way to say “I would like.” So we could use vorrei instead of voglio (I want) or prendo (I take) when placing orders. |
| Cinzia: Mm, yes. Voglio sounds a little bit aggressive. |
| Marco: Yes. And prendo also, but we must remember that we can hear all three cases, vorrei, voglio or prendo, because in Italian, very often, it is the tone of the voice that gives the politeness to the speech. |
| Cinzia: Yes, exactly. |
| Marco: But just by a neutral point of view, let’s say, reading from a book, vorrei, voglio and prendo, vorrei is absolutely the most formal. |
| Cinzia: So now, let’s take a look at its conjugation. Io vorrei |
| Marco: “I would like” |
| Cinzia: Tu vorresti |
| Marco: "You would like" |
| Cinzia: Lui / lei vorrebbe |
| Marco: "He/she would like" |
| Cinzia: Noi vorremmo |
| Marco: "We would like" |
| Cinzia: Voi vorreste |
| Marco: "You would like" |
| Cinzia: Loro vorrebbero |
| Marco: "They would like." So listeners, please practice, especially io vorrei and noi vorremmo because they are the ones you would most likely use in an Italian restaurant, cafe or any place where you’re ordering something. |
| Cinzia: So now, let’s take a look at “a posto” which actually is an expression that I love because it literally means “in place” or “in order.” |
| Marco: Now, we heard it sometime ago. You use it saying tutto a posto, right? |
| Cinzia: Yes, to say “everything is fine.” Literally meaning “everything is in its right place.” |
| Marco: Okay. So, in shops and restaurants, when you’re ordering, the person taking the order that is the waiter will often ask è a posto così? let me repeat - È a posto così? |
| Cinzia: Meaning, “Would that be all?” |
| Marco: This is inquire if you need anything else or if the order was fine. |
Outro |
| Cinzia: And this wraps up today’s lesson. |
| Marco: Okay then, arrivederci. |
| Cinzia: Ciao, grazie! A presto. |
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