It's official

My departure date is now two weeks away. Count-downs are now officially legit. So, 14 days! It doesn't seem real yet. I promise I'll try to keep the pre-Italy posts to a minimum. Emphasis on 'try.'


While I get ready, so can you.

First, everyone asks where Parma is.
1. It is in Italy.
2. It is in northern Italy, as I like to say, in the lacy stocking part of the boot.
3. It is in the region of Emilia-Romagna (like a state).
Want to know more? Here's the wikipedia page (as if you couldn't find that yourself, but that and a John Grisham novel compose the majority of my knowledge about the city, sooo lots to learn!) and a Google map.

Some other notes:
It is the home of Parmesan cheese (smack yourself on the forehead now if you hadn't put two and two together until now).
I have been told it is 'the capital of stuffed pasta.' My palate eagerly anticipates.

Mildly relevant trivia:
There is a Parma, Idaho that is just a few minutes off from being at the same latitude as Parma, E-R, Italia. I can thank Google Maps' indecision for revealing that nugget to me.


Now, some Italiano.
I can't help but start with phonology. It's almost the same as Spanish, vowel-wise. Consonants, lucky for us, are also pretty consistent between English, Spanish, and Italian, with a few orthographical  exceptions.

• ce or ci: pronounced che or chi, otherwise it's a hard c, like cat
  
• (c)che or (c)chi: a hard c, like kilt
• qu: pronounced like the English qu, like in QUeen
• gue or gui: the u is pronounced
  

If you're familiar with Spanish, this takes some getting used to. Is that it?

• Double vowels are held longer. Imagine 'ecco' like eck-co and 'ucello' like ucelllllo. Of course, in real speech the distinction is more subtle, but that's the theory anyway. 

The more I think about this - I haven't had to in a long time - the more nuances I start to find.

• s: pronounced like z before a vowel
• ss: pronounced like super
• z: pronounced more like a tz, easy reference, pizza!

There's also a very particular word/sound, written 'gli,' whose proper articulation remains shrouded in mystery. It's almost like li/lee, but this velar effect on the L, caused by the g. Hopefully this will be one of the many things I improve whilst in Italia.
You are now ready to go forth and read Italian out loud and perhaps sound like you know what you're saying. 

P. S. This would have been infinitely easier if everyone knew the International Phonetic Alphabet. Perhaps you should go learn that, as well.