Hello everyone, welcome back to italianpod101.com. |
My name is Desy. |
Mi chiamo Desy. |
And in this video, we're going to learn together what happens in October in Italy. |
ottobre in Italia |
October in Italian is Ottobre, Ottobre. |
Please don't get confused just because Otto, Otto means eight. |
It's not August, it's not the eighth month of the year, but it's October the tenth. |
That being said, not the first day of October, but just the second. |
So il due di Ottobre, il due di Ottobre è la festa dei nonni. |
È la festa dei nonni, grandparents' day. |
The second of October is actually the day when guardian angels were celebrated. |
I mean they're still celebrated, but that's also why they picked that day for grandparents |
because they're called the Angeli Custodi sulla terra. |
So guardian angels on earth. |
Angeli Custodi sulla terra. |
On this day, i nipoti, nipoti, so nephews, actually nipote, nipote, singular form, |
it's used both for female and male, grandchild, while grandchildren is nipoti, nipoti, |
both for female and male as well. |
Nipoti is also nephew if you are the uncle or the aunt, for example, same word, |
but nonni, nonni is grandparents, so nonno, nonno is grandpa and nonna, nonna is grandma or grandmother. |
We don't really have a shortened way to say nonno or nonna. |
On this date you congratulate them saying auguri, auguri, so congratulations in general, |
or grazie and a postcard or some flowers, grazie, so thank you. |
There aren't many celebrations on specific days, so fast forward to almost the end of October, |
the 25th is actually the World Pasta Day. |
So you may know it because it's everywhere, but it's the day when people celebrate pasta |
and in particular since it's the most used meal in Italy, the most consumed meal in Italy, |
we celebrated eating different types of pasta. |
The most common one is corta and rigata, corta, short and rigata, edged, |
so there are little lines on top of the pasta, you know, like rigatoni, for example, or penne. |
Actually every type can be either liscia, liscia, so smooth, liscia, or rigata, as I just said. |
The difference is that rigata is most common, liscia is not really used that much. |
I prefer edged pasta because |
because |
So if there is liscia and rigata, then we also have the contrary of corta, so short, as I just said, |
long, lunga, pasta lunga, like spaghetti, fettuccine, linguine, you tell me, tagliatelle also. |
Depending on the sauce that you want to eat, you choose the pasta, that's how it goes. |
Then of course the 31st is Halloween, even though in Italian we say Halloween, different accent, |
but anyway, there has been controversy about this celebration because people say that that's |
a pagana, festa, so a pagan celebration, festa pagana, but actually it turns out that in the past |
there were many rituals that were actually kind of similar to what happens on Halloween in other countries. |
Also it has to be said that in Italy we celebrate Ogni Santi or Tutti Santi on the 1st of November, |
so the night is actually when the thing happens and what I mean with the thing is that we celebrate |
every saint, Tutti Santi or Ogni Santi, each saint, which to be fair is dead people, |
so it makes sense to celebrate il giorno dei morti, the day of the death, for us as well. |
Either way, recently it has become more common, especially for kids, to celebrate Halloween, |
so in Italy too they say trick or treat, but they say dolcetto or scherzetto, dolcetto, |
which is sweet, tiny sweet, so treat, dolcetto, or scherzetto, scherzetto, which comes from scherzo, |
which is prank, so little prank, scherzetto. |
Some more common vocabulary about this would be of course pumpkin, so zucca, zucca, |
then there are fantasmi, ghosts, fantasmi, or cappello da strega, witch head or wizard head, |
if it's stregone, stregone, so the male version, or also spiders, so ragni, or ragnatele, |
spider webs, ragnatele, and then I'd say that you can also see like pirate costumes, so pirati, |
or like prisoners, prigionieri, pirati, prigionieri, and so on, like we're evolving on costumes as well. |
On top of specific days, celebrations, October is known for vendemmia in Italy, vendemmia. |
Vendemmia actually happens from July till November, but depending on which region you're in |
and what kind of wine you're producing, October is a big month for vendemmia. |
So what does vendemmia mean? It's actually grape picking, but the grape that you use for wine. |
So wine, grape picking. |
The grapes are ready for vendemmia, so are ready to be picked, they're mature enough. |
It's interesting how in the past they actually picked the grapes, then they put that in big containers |
called tinozzi, tinozzi, and then people just stepped on it, so calpestare, step on calpestare |
l'uva, so that the must of grapes, il mosto d'uva, came out of the big tinozzi, of the big containers. |
And then calpestare l'uva, so stepped on grapes, scalzi, barefoot, scalzi. |
Or you could say a piedi nudi. A piedi nudi literally means with naked feet, piedi nudi, |
but you can also say scalzi, which means without calze, which is socks, right? |
Because the S before the word makes it the contrary. |
So scalzi, or a piedi nudi, pestavano, they stepped on l'uva, to make wine, per fare il vino. |
Something else that happens in October is the beginning of university year. |
So when you start, you're a freshman, right? |
That's called matricola, matricola in Italian, because matricola is actually the serial number |
that you get on your student card, on your tessera universitaria, tessera universitaria, |
so university card, and that's where it comes from. |
So if you are a matricola, you're new, because you just got your serial number. |
University starts in October, which means that there were admission tests before, |
even like March or April, some just September, okay, but it depends on the university, of course. |
If you don't have a test di ammissione, which is admission test, |
then your university is ad accesso libero, free access, accesso libero, free admission, ammissione libera. |
Either way, the moment you start university is the best one, |
because you don't have any exams to take before starting the year, so it's when you enjoy the full summer. |
Speaking of which, in this month it's not too cold yet, but I wouldn't say you can go to the sea. |
Some years maybe, depending on how the summer went in the south, |
but for the rest I'd say that it starts getting colder, so I'd advise to go to cities if you want to visit Italy |
and not really to the seaside, but still you can explore easily because it's not super cold, |
but it's still nice to go, to be outside. It's like chilly, I'd say. |
Lastly, but not less important, not everyone knows that October is also known as the pink month, |
and why is that? Because it's the month of prevention for female cancers, |
so basically breast cancers and so on, but yeah, it's pink October, Ottobre Rosa. |
You can find many visite di prevenzione, prevention visits, gratuite, so for free. |
So yeah, that's pretty much what happens in October. I hope I gave you a general overview of the month. |
Please let me know in the comments what happens during this month in your country |
and maybe how you celebrate if you do Halloween. |
And remember, if you haven't done it yet, you can sign up for your free lifetime account on ItalianPod101.com. |
Thank you for watching and I'll see you soon. Bye bye, ciao ciao! |
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