Learn how to discuss your well-being
Get this lesson’s key vocab, their translations and pronunciations. Sign up for your Free Lifetime Account Now and get 7 Days of Premium Access including this feature.
Unlock Lesson Notes and Transcripts for every single lesson. Sign Up for a Free Lifetime Account and Get 7 Days of Premium Access.
| Hi, everyone! I'm Felice Angelini. |
| Ciao a tutti, sono Felice Angelini. |
| Welcome to another Italian Whiteboard Lesson! |
| In this lesson, you'll learn how to talk about well-being in Italian. |
| Let's get started! |
| Questions like "How are you?" or "How are you doing?" are very common in English, either as a greeting or during small talk. In Italian, people ask these questions as well, but typically, you'll hear these questions when two people haven't seen each other for a while or when they're genuinely concerned about the well-being of the other person. |
| For example, imagine two neighbors run into each other in an apartment lobby, and they haven't seen each other for months. |
| Let's hear what the two might say. |
| A: Come stai? |
| B: Sto bene, grazie. |
| Well, in this informal situation, we find, in the question, stai is "are you." |
| And in the answer, sto means "I am"; bene means "well," and then you say grazie, "thank you," to be kind. |
| All right. So, on the other side of the board here, I listed a few other ways you can answer the question, Come stai? |
| Let's take a look together. |
| Sto abbastanza bene, grazie. "I'm pretty good, thank you." |
| Sto benissimo, grazie. "I'm great, thank you." |
| Sto molto bene, grazie. "I'm very well, thank you." |
| abbastanza bene, "pretty good" |
| benissimo, "great" |
| molto bene, "very well" |
| But, finally, if you're not feeling good, you can say: |
| Non sto molto bene. "I'm not very well." |
| This answer has a different structure. Note how you need to put non in front of the verb. Also, if you don't want to sound harsh, it's better to add molto. |
| Okay, now, let's read these responses one more time. Feel free to read after me. |
| Sto abbastanza bene, grazie. |
| Sto benissimo, grazie. |
| Sto molto bene, grazie. |
| Non sto molto bene. |
| Good job! Okay. |
| I listed all the well-being phrases here, in order, from positive to negative. |
| benissimo -> molto bene -> bene -> abbastanza bene -> non molto bene |
| non molto bene |
| And note, benissimo is the same as molto bene. |
| All of these, except for one, have the same structure: |
| Sto [CONDITION], grazie. |
| "I'm [CONDITION], thank you." |
| Remember that if you want to say that you're not so good, the phrase has a slightly different structure - Non sto molto bene. |
| Well, you can shorten the pattern by just stating your current state, without any additional words: |
| Abbastanza bene. |
| Benissimo. |
| Molto bene. |
| Non molto bene. |
| Ciao ciao "sto," ciao ciao "grazie." |
| Ciao ciao "sto," ciao ciao "grazie." |
| Ciao ciao ciao ciao "sto." |
| Okay? |
| But in formal situation, I suggest you say grazie at the end of the answer. |
Comments
Hide