Your Monthly Dose of Italian - Best of October 2024

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Before we start, do you want a bundle of 30 printable Italian PDF cheat sheets teaching you words and phrases for conversations for free? Then click the link in the description and sign up for a free lifetime account to get access. Hello, everyone. Welcome back to ItalianPod101.com. My name is Desi. Mi chiamo Desi. And in this video, we're going to talk about superstition in Italy. Superstizione in Italia. La superstizione. Now superstizione is the category, like the noun, ma le superstizioni, plural form, there are many, right? And they're believed to be truth or even like I don't believe it, but I'll do that anyway. That's the light motive in Italy. Superstizioni are stronger, I would say, in the South, but not only, also in the old generations. Infatti, in fact, I remember my grandma always telling me what would bring me good luck, fortuna, fortuna, or sfortuna, sfortuna, bad luck. Portare fortuna, to bring luck. Portare sfortuna, to bring bad luck, is when something, yeah, is a bad thing for you. There are also cattivi segni, bad signs, cattivi segni, or buon segno, buon segno, good signs. Let's see some of them together. This is probably everywhere, but if a person breaks a mirror, it brings bad luck. Sette anni, actually, seven years. In front of you, of course. A black cat, un gatto nero, attraversa, crosses the street. What if you passi sotto una scala? Passare, to go through, under, sotto, una scala, ladder. Not like stairs because, of course, you have to if you're climbing stairs, but ladder, like the one that you… If you passi sotto una scala, that's also bad luck. Specifically, you will not get married. Una persona apre un ombrello in casa. A person opens, apre, un ombrello in casa. If you open an umbrella inside the house, bad luck too, cattiva fortuna. What if you rovesci il sale? Rovesciare il sale, so to drop, to spill the salt, like on the table. Rovesciare il sale, the salt, also non buono, not good. Però, with the salt, you can do this, like back behind you. You throw some salt behind you and that should rebalance things. Something else that is used to rebalance or to bring luck is il ferro di cavallo. So like the horseshoe, ferro di cavallo. In fact, you can see it on doors when you enter Italian houses. That's because it reminds the sea of Christ, but also because in the past, the iron was used to fight sickness. So again, superstition, so that's where it comes from. Also, when you're hearing a bad topic, for example, when someone is talking about death or something that would bring bad luck like, oh, well, maybe you will lose your job, maybe this will happen, blah, blah, blah, you say tocco ferro. So I touch, tocco ferro, and you have to actually look for iron and touch it. So that rebalances things. Something else used as a lucky charm, so porta fortuna, literally luck bringer, porta fortuna, is il cornetto rosso. So the little horn, the red one, especially in the south, Naples and so on. Cornetto rosso, the red horn. Something else that brings good luck is, of course, il quadrifoglio. Quindi trovare un quadrifoglio, to find a clover. Quadri, from four, and foglio, leaves, quadrifoglio. Even better if you gift it to someone, that will be the lucky one, or if someone gifts that to you. Oppure, again, una coccinella, a ladybug, is a good sign. Una coccinella vola su di te, flies on you, that's a good sign. Going back to things that bring bad luck though, because we'll have more about that than good luck. Anyway, you just have to avoid this so it will still be good luck somehow. If you're an actor, you do not want to wear purple in the theater. Non indossare il viola, not wear purple. Non indossare il viola if you're an actor, se sei un attore o attrice, actress, because that's the same color that the priest uses for functions about death. So you don't want to bring that vibe on the stage. Anche i numeri, also numbers, can bring good or bad luck. Per esempio, il numero tredici, thirteen, because tredici was the number of people that were at the last supper. Quindi tredici non porta buona fortuna. Thirteen doesn't bring good luck. Although for some people it does, so there are different interpretations here. It really depends on regions and on families, I would say. While we all agree that seventeen, diciassette, non porta fortuna, doesn't bring luck, seventeen. Why is that? Because seventeen, written in Roman numbers, so you would have the XVII, if you change the order, it's vixi, so I live, which implies that you died. That's why seventeen is not good. Something else that has to do with sickness or death in general is, for example, if three people make the bed all together, non si fa il letto in tre persone, because you assume that there is a sick one. Because why would you have three people to make the bed? Should be one or two if they live together, but three would mean that there is someone that cannot be there from the couple, blah, blah. Quindi non si fa il letto in tre. There is no bed-making in tre, okay. Also, don't sit at the corner of the table, non sedersi all'angolo della tavola or sull'angolo della tavola, because it means that you will not get married, again, because there is no space for your partner, okay. Also, if you do want to get married, you want to avoid having your feet swept away like with the broom, by someone. Se ti spazzo i piedi, non ti sposi. If I spazzo, broom, your feet, you don't get married. Of course, all of this depends a lot on regions and traditions of the family, but those are quite general. You can even find them on books. And lastly, I want to leave you with a rhyme. Nè di venere, nè di marte, non ci si sposa e non si parte. Nè di venere, venere from Venus to Friday, venerdì. Quindi not on Fridays, venerdì. Nè di marte, marte comes from Mars, so martedì, Tuesday. So on Fridays and Tuesdays, non ci si sposa, you don't get married, and non si parte, and you don't depart, you don't start a trip, a journey, you don't go away on Tuesdays and Fridays. And that has something to do with gods, like Mars was the worst god, you don't want to, you know, have anything to do with him. And venere also had something that was not really vibing with departing or getting married, yeah, because she could get jealous. Quindi my tip, Italian tip, don't book your holidays starting on Tuesdays or Fridays, just in case, you know. Thank you for watching. I hope you enjoyed this cultural insight. I'm really curious to know about your countries and your traditions. So please comment down below and if you haven't done it yet, you can sign up for your free lifetime account on ItalianPod101.com. Ciao ciao! I'll see you soon. Bye! Now that you're finished with this lesson, don't forget, as a free bonus, you get over 30 conversation cheat sheets, but only if you sign up via the link in the description. You'll learn how to have flowing conversations and how to answer the most common questions. You can also print out these colorful cheat sheets to keep as physical study material. So don't miss out on this free gift. Click the link in the description and sign up for a free lifetime account to get your PDF cheat sheets. Wait! Before we start, do you want a bundle of 30 printable Italian PDF cheat sheets teaching you words and phrases for conversations for free? Then click the link in the description and sign up for a free lifetime account to get access. Hello, everyone. Welcome back to ItalianPod101.com. My name is Desi. And in this video, I'm going to tell you a legend, a traditional Italian story. Una storia tradizionale italiana. Storia, story, traditional, tradizionale is the adjective and italiana too. Leggenda, legend, leggenda. It is called La Leggenda dei Giorni della Merla. La Merla is the female of the blackbird, Merla. Merlo is the male, Merla, female. So Merla's days. I giorni della Merla. Cosa sono i giorni della Merla? What are days of Merla? Blackbird's days. Sono a fine gennaio. They're at the end of January. Specifically 29, 30, e 31. So 29, 30, and 31, 31st of January. Di gennaio. And why are they called like this? Well, gennaio, un mese di 28 giorni, è un mese dispettoso. January, a month of 28 days, un mese di 28 giorni, è un mese dispettoso. It's a naughty month, mischievous, okay. Of course, gennaio being personalized here, like it was a character. When the blackbird goes out, esce, to look for food, per cercare il cibo. Quando la Merla esce per cercare il cibo, gennaio usa vento, neve, e pioggia. Gennaio uses vento, neve, e pioggia, wind, snow, rain, per darle fastidio. Per, to, darle, to her, fastidio, nuisance, so to annoy her. Un anno, one year, la Merla, the blackbird, per evitare gli scherzi di gennaio, to avoid the pranks of January, per evitare gli scherzi di gennaio, raccoglie cibo per tutti i 28 giorni. She collects, she gathers, raccoglie cibo, food, per tutti i 28 giorni. For all the 28 days, like prior to that, she gathers enough per i 28 giorni. Quindi raccoglie abbastanza cibo per tutti i 28 giorni. Enough food, abbastanza cibo. E non esce mai dal nido. And she never goes out, non esce mai dal nido, from the nest. Quando finisce il gennaio, quindi when the month of January ends, quando finisce il gennaio, la Merla esce. The blackbird goes out, esce. Ma non sa, but she doesn't know, ma non sa che gennaio, that gennaio, January, always more spiteful, sempre più dispettoso, ha chiesto in prestito. So he asked, ha chiesto in prestito tre giorni a febbraio. So he asked February to lend him three days as a loan. In fact, in the old calendar, January was shorter than February and then, as we all know, it got actually the other way around. Probably because gennaio asked February. He asked for three days more to February, right? So ora si può vendicare. Ora, now, he can have his revenge. Si può vendicare, vendicarsi. Quindi, so what happens next? Gennaio fa una tempesta. Gennaio makes a storm, tempesta. So a cold storm, like a blizzard, a cold storm, an icy storm. The blackbird is forced, costretta, a ripararsi, to take cover, a ripararsi in un cammino, in a chimney, in un camino. La merla, the blackbird, that till now, finora, had white feathers, le piume bianche, rimane nel cammino per tre giorni. She stays in the chimney for three days. Rimane nel cammino per tre giorni. Quando esce, when she goes out, è tutta sporca. She's all covered in dirt and black, è nera. Quando esce, è tutta sporca e nera. Da quel giorno, since that day, tutti i merli sono neri. Since that day, all blackbirds are black. Note that in Italian, merla doesn't have the word black inside. There is no nero inside merla or merlo. And what about January? Gennaio, since that day, da quel giorno, gennaio, ogni tanto, sometimes, fa il dispettoso. So he goes back to be spiteful, to be mischievous. Fa il dispettoso negli ultimi tre giorni di gennaio. In the last three days of January. Negli ultimi giorni di gennaio. During the last three days of January, right? Now, what does this mean? The last three days of January are called i giorni della merla, the merla, the blackbird's days. And those are believed to be the coldest of the year. So i più freddi dell'anno, i giorni più freddi dell'anno, the coldest days of the year. And it's also believed that if those days are actually really cold, then we're going to have a gorgeous spring with flowers and then hot summer and so on. But if those days are not cold enough, then we're going to be unlucky for the rest of the year, basically, because spring is going to be cold and then summer is going to be hot and cold, blah, blah, blah. Quindi i tre giorni della merla, the three days of the merla, set the rest of the year, okay? There are different versions, of course, depending on the region or who tells that. For example, one says that it was the merla who was being mischievous and went to January and was like, ha, ha, ha, your cold didn't do anything to me, blah, blah, blah. So he had to take revenge or anyway, stuff like that. Però this is told to kids, at least I remember my grandma telling that to me. When we get to those days, you can hear on the news, ah, i giorni della merla arrived. And then there's always this legend going on in schools or on TV. So you do happen to know even if no one told you, okay? There is also a less dramatic version that says just that blackbirds, they were still white in the past, but since they had to take cover from the coldness, they went into chimneys and then the dirty made them black without them having this fight with January. But I like the first version more. Anyway, is this story in other countries as well? I actually have no idea, so I would like to know. Please let me know in the comments. Also, if you want to be able to have real Italian conversations with native speakers, click the link in the description and download our PDF lessons in order to learn Italian in the fastest, easiest, and most fun way possible. I'll see you soon! Ci vediamo presto! Bye bye! Ciao ciao! Now that you're finished with this lesson, don't forget, as a free bonus, you get over 30 conversation cheat sheets, but only if you sign up via the link in the description. You'll learn how to have flowing conversations and how to answer the most common questions. 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