Italian Vocabulary

There are many benefits of staying away from the more well known cities in Italy. Some of the benefits; fewer tourists, discovery of little known treasures, exposure to a less commercial environment; and …you get to use your newly honed Italian language skills!! In cities like Rome, Florence, Venice, Milan, Siena, etc., there are a lot of Italians who speak English and very well. They are typically kind enough to recognize you are not Italian and speak English to you first before you even have to worry about if they will understand you. However – in a town such as Arezzo, there is not as much English spoken – so you get to exercise the vast dictionary of the Italian language you have stored in your head before your trip … or so I thought.

It was either the first or second day in Arezzo and we had not adjusted to the 6 & 8 hour time change, much less the different meal schedule that is “Italian”.  You soon learn the Italian meal schedule is a long and relaxing lunch (2-3 hours), and dinner (or supper for those of us in the Southern US) starts no earlier than 8pm. You can always tell the Americans, they are sitting in the otherwise empty restaurants early – as soon as they are open. Our American clocks were telling us we should have been asleep, and our stomachs were screaming “FEED ME”. The decision was quickly made that we would go to a “Rosticceria” (a store that sells cooked meats and other prepared food) and take an early dinner back to the room. This particular rosticceria just down the street from Camera Con Vista, had many selections among which was small individual pizzas. I gathered all my courage and timidly stepped up and greeted the woman behind the counter … “Buona Sera, … Vorremmo una pizza con il formaggio e una pizza con carciofi"  (Good evening,  we would like a pizza with cheese and a pizza with artichokes) … easy enough – well understood, the pizzas were thrown in the oven to be warmed. I was feeling good about my abilities to place the order.  While the pizzas were warming … I remembered we wanted a couple of drinks to take with us. In Italy they make this wonderful peach flavored tea .. so with a new found confidence here I go again … “Anche … due bottiglia de te – te di pesce per favore".  Laughter … bending over laughter from behind the counter. Oh no .. what did I say? You see, I had ordered 2 bottles of tea – the FISH tea please!!! After she could contain herself, she kindly and gently corrected me … in English. “You would like the peach tea, yes? … ‘ you must understand pesce is fish’ and ‘pesca is peach’”.  After receiving our pizza, tea and a warm nod for my attempts at Italian, we departed laughing all the way back up the hill to the hotel.