" Heres a beginning to an idiots guide to a few linguistic loopholes to be aware of when coming to live in Italy. Actually, I''d like this to be a work in progress - so please add your own! Missing pairs. some words sound like you know them - but have different meaning in Italian: ""Accidenti"" is not accident (incidente) but a mild exclamation - ""damn!"" ""Scotch"" is not only whiskey, but the word used to say sticky tape. (Scotchtape) ""argumento"" is not an arguement - but a topic, or discussion. ""discusione"", however, is often an arguement. Some words have boon taken from the English language - and twisted in meaning and pronunciation: ""rostbif"" (sometimes written that way - is roast beef ""staff"", pronunced to rhyme with daff as in Daffy Duck, is any group of proffessionals (when they''re not an ""equipe"" ""tilt"" is a good TV newsreaders work. The trains are in ""tilt"" for bad weather, the airports are in ""tilt"" from a traffic controllers strike (get used to this one - you''ll hear it often) and it comes, obviously, from the pinball table warning. Some words you might have trouble pronuoncing: Coin - the chain store, is not pronounced like the metal piece of money, but co-in. Coop - the supermarket, is NOT pronuonced like co-op, as in co-operative (even though that''s what it means, but ""cop"", or often in Tuscany, ""Hop"" or ""Hoppe"". Euro - the new money (what''s that then?) is pronounced with as many syllables as you can squeeze in there: eeehhh--oooowww-rrrr-ooooohhh. "

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" Double Negatives After years of English grammar teachers drilling us on the forbidden double negative, one learns that in italiano the double negative is embraced and celebrated. e.g. ""non fa niente"" = ""it doesn''t make nothing"" = ""nothing not done"" which best translates to ""It doesn''t matter"" or ""No harm done"". Not for nothing, but there are countless other examples. "

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