Purché is a conjunction that introduces a conditional clause, much like the expressions as long as or provided that in English. It is the combination of pure, in the archaic sense of ‘only’, and che (that). The verb that follows purché is normally in the subjunctive mood, as you can see from the following example …
The word for shower in Italian is doccia (feminine, plural: docce). It derives from the now-obsolete doccio, the term for an archaic kind of gutter or drainpipe. As in English, doccia can refer to the apparatus that produces the spray of water, the cubicle itself, and the act of showering. To take / to have …
A person who is always ready to start an argument or pick a fight, often over trivial matters, is an attaccabrighe in Italian. The closest English translations are troublemaker and quarrelsome person. Because it is an invariable noun, its form does not change if you are talking about a woman or multiple people. The word …
The Italian word for phone number is numero di telefono (masculine, plural: numeri di telefono). All About Italian Phone Numbers Landline numbers (numeri fissi) always start with the digit 0 and are 6 to 11 digits long. For example, in the city of Turin where we used to live, all landline numbers have the area …
The other day, my husband and I decided to watch Johnny Stecchino, an Italian comedy from the early 1990s directed by and starring the fantastically funny Roberto Benigni. The story follows Dante, a naive yet kind-hearted bus driver and part-time banana thief, whose uncanny physical resemblance to Sicilian mobster-turned-police informant Johnny Stecchino lands him in …
