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We're All About Italy

Culture

Killer Italian Shoes that Can Actually Maim a Flirt?

4/30/2025

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I understand this was a long time ago, but really, stabbing someone for flirting? If the tipo actually puts his hands on the woman, perhaps. Puncture him all you want.

In reality, I've witnessed pappagalli (parrots or wolves) flirting with pretty ladies walking by in Rome and other Italian cities, and have found their comments are actually complimentary in nature, and because of their culture, can actually be fairly poetic...
  • "Sei così bella che mi fai dimenticare il mio nome". (You’re so beautiful, you make me forget my own name.)
  • "Complimenti alla mamma" (Compliments to your mother).
  • "Nel cielo manca un angelo?" (Is heaven missing an angel?)
  • "Dove sei stata/o tutta la mia vita?" (Where have you been all my life?).
  • "Hai una mappa? Continuo a perdermi nei tuoi occhi."  (Do you have a map? Because I keep getting lost in your eyes!)
  • "Come sei carina/o!" (How cute you are!)
  • "Questo vestito ti sta belissimo." (You look beautiful in this dress.)
  • "Il tuo sorriso è contagioso!" (Your smile is contagious.)
  • "Mi puoi incidere il tuo numero di telefono sul cuore?" (Can you engrave your telephone number on my heart?)
  • "Mi fai sciogliere come il gelato al sole." (You make me melt like ice cream in the sun.)

Flirting is part of life in Italy and it even has a poetic name: fare la civetta, which literally
means "to make like an owl", or as we might say, making googly eyes at a girl. 

When in Italy, young ladies have to keep this in mind: More so than American men, Italian single men--even into their Fifties--actually have a great respect for women. Many single Italian men are actually Mama's boys and traditionally live with their Mamma until they get married! 

No stabbing. Go easy on them. Va bene?

--Jerry Finzi

You might also be interested in:

Fare la Civetta: Flirting in Italy
Expressions of Love in Italian: Finding Love in Italy
Benefits of Kissing Like an Italian
Juliette's House in Verona: Phony! Fake! Falso!
Love Locks in Verona

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Parlo Italian-Americano?

4/26/2025

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My father was born in Molfetta, Puglia in the South. My Mom's mother and father came from Naples. Both spoke dialects of Italian. My mother often said that my father's dialect was so different from hers that she couldn't understand certain words. They were like different languages, far apart from Italian. In the late 1800s, most Italian immigrants came from the South: Campania, Calabria, Puglia or Sicily. In time, Italian-Americans have slurred local dialects even more... softening consanants, truncating words or even swapping sounds completely, like P to B, C tp G or V to F.

If you watch the Godfather, especially the scenes in GF II showing Vito Corleone as a young man, you can hear this sort of dialect from Sicily. The words in the South are often totally different. Lots of slang is used.
Liaisons happen... Usually, the end of one word attaches to the beginning of the next word. Beginnings of words are often omitted. Even Italians consider these dialects like another language... for example, the announcements on the train from Bari to Rome are in English, Italian and "
Dialetto". Dialect sounds nothing like regular Italian down South.

Now, add to all this the fact that Italian immigrants in American spoke a sort of second hand Italian dialect, much was lost to misunderstood pronunciations and the fact that many (like my parents) didn't want to speak Italian in the home. When I asked why my parents didn't teach us Italian, they said they wanted an "All-American" home for us. Even today in the South parents don't want their children to speak Dialect when they move to the big cities in Italy. They are looked down upon for speaking it by Northern Italians. What a shame...   These dialects are what makes Italian so interesting.

Here are a collection of Italian-American wods and phrases that I grew up with... spelled phonetically:

Agida/Agita                   Acid indigestion/aggravation
Ah-fa Nabalee                Get out of Here/Go to Naples
Ah-shpette                     Wait!
Ah-Va-Fan-gool             Go f*ck yourself
Bah-Bookia                   
Papocchio, a mess, allmixed up
Bah-fongool                   Go f*ck yourself

Ba-cha-ga-loop              Wolf Hunter or Brave (not dummy, like some think)
Bish-Gut                         biscotti/cookie
Bock-owz                       Bathroom/stink house, Back House or outhouse. 
Bomba-lonee                 Little Kid
Boochach                       Bitch/c*nt
Boombotz                       Idiot/Crazy
Boo-tahn'                        puttana, whore

Baz-ih-nigole                  Basil
Brahgonne                      Drunk
Brah-jole                         bracciole/slang for penis 

Cabbadost                     Thick head/stubborn
Chooch                           Big Baby-a put-down, or vagina

ComoseeCyam?            What do you call it?
Coh-Yonees                   Balls
Dees-Gradseeyad        
disgraziad, misfortune, bad luck, screw-up
Gal-ay-mahd                  Calimari/squid
Facha-broot                   Ugly face

Fin-ook                           Finoccichio/Fennel, 
Gabba-Dost                   Thick Head
Gabeesh?                        Understand?
Gavone                            Pig/Slob/Overeater
Gobba-ghool                   Capicola (a type of cold cut meat)

Googootz                        A fool
Goombah                        Pal/Comrade/Friend
GooMahd                        Girlfriend
GOT-zo!                           What Balls!
Jadrool                            Lazy bum (cucumber)

Jamoke                           Idiot
Kay-Gotz                         What the F*ck

Keh -sa-deech?               How are you?
Mal-yOke                         Evil eye
Mamaluke                       Idiot/stupid/screw-up
Manageya                        Damn it/Curse it
Managutt                         Manicotti (pasta)
Mah-done!                       Madonna mia! (exclamation)
Mopeen                           Dish Cloth, Rag
Medz-a-medz                  So-so/half and half/not so much
Mutzarelle                       Mozzarella cheese
Nabolee-DAHN               Neapolitan/someone from Naples
Pasta-vazool                   Pasta fagioli (bean soup)
piezahn                            Friend/countryman/brother
Pitza-gain                        Pizzagaina, Egg-meat pie
Ooo-Fah                           I've had it/I'm fed up 
Rigutt                                Ricotta cheese
Rompee-Coyownee         Ball Buster (Rompicoglione or -palle, for balls)
Shka-roll                           Escarole/Cash money
sfatcheem                       a Jerk
SkeeVo                             Disgusting

Stroonz                            an Ass
Stroonz-a-medz              Half ass
Strombolone                   Clumsy

Stata-Geet                       Shut Up
Skutch                             Pest
Stoon-od                         Idiot
StuGotz                           Screw it/F*ck it
TooSee Batz                   You're crazy
Vena Ka, Vena Ga          Come here

--Jerry Finzi

If you found this post useful, please LIKE it and tell your friends about Grand Voyage Italy. Ciao!   



Copyright, Jerry Finzi, Grand Voyage Italy, All rights reserved     


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Bialetti Sold to Chinese - Death by Chopstix?

4/16/2025

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When you think of Italy, some think of a Ferrari, while others may think of Gucci, Nutella, Fiat or Barilla. But just about every Iitalian casa and many around the world have a little, shiny piece of Italy in their cucina...

The famous, Made in Italia, Bialetti Moka pot.

Well, that may soon change. 
Bialetti, the inventor of the octagonal moka pot, an icon of Italian industrial design (and in the Museum of Modern Art's design collection), has reached a deal with NUO Capital to buy the company. They will delist the company from the Italian stock market and then... well, who knows?

NUO Capital, an investment fund, is registered in Luxembourg, but controlled by the Pao Cheng family, one of Hong Kong's wealthiest. Will they keep the manufacture of these famous aluminum pots in Italy, or will the pots be made in China? If this happens, we all know what that means. Perhaps cheap processes, changing the design, or mokas that blow up!

I understand that the company has suffered losses after the ill-advised launch or brick and mortar stores and expanding to kitchen utensils. Did greed take them down the wrong via?

What do you all think of this?

--Jerry Finzi

You Might Also Be Interested In...

The Art, Science and History of Coffee in Italy
Cucina Hacks: Making the Perfect Espresso
Espresso Master, Renato Bialetti Dies at 93
Strange Italy: Espresso Pioneer's Ashes Placed into Moka Pot


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