Jeanne's Next Chapter: Voglio parlare italiano!

Readers of this blog know that more than anything, I want to be able to speak Italian. Nothing prepared me for how difficult it would be for me to learn this new language. As soon as I found out we would be relocating, I was focused on this goal. We bought the Rosetta Stone computer program prior to leaving the U.S. I learned how to say "the woman is swimming" and "the man has blond hair" and have not needed to use either of those phrases since arriving here. I bought dictionaries and workbooks and CDs to listen to in the car. I made flashcards and Italian labels for household items. I figured that learning Italian could be my full time job once I got settled. Unfortunately, my 59 year old brain was not quite as ready for this challenge as the rest of me was.

We found a teacher here in Como through a local tutoring service. Initally, Dave and I signed up for 10 classes and we met together with our teacher Letizia. It was a good start but not the best idea since Dave would rush to our lesson straight from a long day at work and try to focus while I had had several hours each day to study. So we decided that Dave would continue with Rosetta Stone for awhile and I would meet individually with the teacher . She agreed to come to our apartment three times a week for an hour. Being in the comfort of my own home definitely helped and I began to make progress, although I was still frustrated by my inability to initiate a dialogue in public. Similarly to when I was struggling years ago in high school French class, I am better with the written work and verb conjugation but struggle to speak. I would stand at the counter at the macelleria (butcher shop) and start to ask for a cut of meat and go completely blank. Every Italian person I knew told me to just talk....don't worry about the grammar, just jump in. That is easier said than done.

I heard about a language school in Lucca, a small city in Tuscany that uses an immersion method to help people acquire the ability to speak Italian. Dave was heading to the U.S. for a week of business meetings so I signed up for a week at the Lucca Italian School. I chose the option of living with an Italian host to further expose myself to my new language. I arrived on a Sunday evening by train and walked through the old city looking for the address I had written down. I couldn't find the address so I called the phone number and sure enough, I needed to use Italian to ask for help to get there. Luckily, Guiliana was hanging out her third story window waving to me down below on the street. As I sat alone at dinner with her, trying to converse with my 300 word vocabulary, I realized I had truly jumped in and would either sink or swim.

View of Lucca from the city wall

I walked to the school on Monday morning and after an assessment conversation with one of the staff members, was assigned to a small group with three other students. We met each morning for four hours with our teacher Eva, who used a variety of lessons and methods to get us talking. We played games, interviewed one another, and figured out puzzles. Eva spoke with clear, measured speech and was easy to understand. I was oddly relieved to find my intelligent, interesting classmates struggling with the very same issues as I was. We stumbled through our sentences and struggled to remember the correct verbs but we communicated and had lots of fun while doing it.

Our classroom

During the afternoons, activities were offered that provided more exposure to the language as well as to the culture of Tuscany. I participated in a walking tour of Lucca, watched a film, took a cooking class, and visited a Roman aqueduct - all while being totally immersed in Italian. (Initially I was excited when I heard the film had subtitles until I realized that even the subtitles were in Italian too.) As I had hoped, the other students who I met at the school were friendly, independent people with whom I shared much in common.

Lesson in Tuscan cooking

Learning how to make homemade pasta

Lucca, a city which began as a Roman colony in 180 B.C. is the perfect setting for the school. It has a population of 85,000 but the compact, historic city center is enclosed by an intact city wall that dates back to medieval times. This ring of park land has the "passegiata della mura" which is a 5 km promenade that is enjoyed by people strolling, jogging, biking, pushing strollers and walking their dogs. It provided a wonderful way to unwind when one's mind is full of new vocabulary and verb tenses.

After a farewell dinner with new friends, I headed home on Saturday morning. Most students study at the school for multiple weeks but I had the advantage of returning to an ongoing immersion opportunity in my own community. I realized that I can speak in sentences and if I take my time, I can actually make myself be understood. Si, posso davvero parlare italiano! Yes, I can actually speak Italian.

I have a long way to go. I will continue meeting with Letizia at least two times a week and practice every day. My goal is to be able to carry on a conversation with new friends by summer. I can feel brain cells waking up and I have had dreams in which I am trying to speak in Italian. It has been a very humbling experience to realize how difficult this learning process is, especially when I regularly meet people who know four or five languages. My saying for today is: "Non è mai troppo tardi per insegnare a un vecchio cane nuovi trucchi." It is never too late to teach an old dog new tricks.