Yesterday, in the late afternoon, I had my first meeting with my Each One teach One group; the reason why we didn’t have before it’s because I was on holiday in Italy for a while and even if we planned to do a video-meeting during that period, it wasn’t really possible due to the fact that I was travelling around the Italian Alps and the internet connection could be jerky up there!
Anyway, my group is formed by myself, obviously, Camille and Audrey; I’m going to teach Italian to them and they will teach me French.
We met in front of the bar Public Corner in Keskustori, since we were planning to take something to drink there and the girls were planning to seat outside to enjoy the super-warm Finnish autumn! The only problem was that the outside terrace of this bar was already gone so we moved to the Café inside the Sokos’ building.
We started talking about random things like school etc. and after we finished to drink we moved to the supermarket in the basement of Sokos.
There we started to learn something new by searching for differences and similarities in between our languages and since they are really close to each other, I think that “learning process” will be downhill!
Here in the table below there are some of the words that we learned during this meeting and after that we realised that probably for us, the most weird language is English, because why do you have to call it Pineapple when even in Finland they call it Ananas? …it doesn’t even look like an apple!
English |
Italian |
French |
A supermarket |
Un supermercato |
Un supermarché |
Fruits: |
Frutta: |
Fruits: |
Banana |
Banana |
Banane |
watermelon |
Anguria |
Pastèque |
Peach |
Pesca |
Pèche |
Melon |
Melone |
Melon |
Pineapple |
Ananas |
Ananas |
Apricot |
Albicocca |
Abricot |
Lemon |
Limone |
Citron |
Tomato |
Pomodoro |
Tomate |
Apple |
Mela / Pomo |
Pom |
Vegetables: |
Verdura / Legumi: |
Légumes: |
Zuchini |
Zucchine |
Courgette |
Eggplant |
Melanzana |
Aubergine |
Potato |
Patata |
Pomme de terre |
Pumpkin |
Zucca |
Citrouille |
Carot |
Carota |
Carotte |
Broccoli |
Broccoli |
Brocoli |
Salad |
Insalata |
Salade |
Cauliflower |
Cavolfiore |
Chou-fleur |
Chips |
Patatine |
Chips |
Cheese |
Formaggio |
Fromage |
Meat |
Carne |
Viande |
Chicken |
Pollo |
Poulet |
Miced meat |
Carne macinata |
Viande hachée |
Ham |
Prosciutto |
Jambon |
Turkey |
Tacchino |
Dinde |
Fish |
Pesce |
Poisson |
Check-out |
Cassa |
Caisse |
Salt |
Sale |
Sel |
Sugar |
Zucchero |
Sucre |
Pepper |
Pepe |
Poivre |
Soap |
Sapone |
Savon |
Body spray |
Deodorante |
Déodorant |
As a reflection on the outcome of the first meeting, I had with Camille and Audrey, I can say that it was kind of fun and really chill but at the same time, even if this is just the beginning, I got to know how really close our languages are; I even realised that some words in my home-city dialect sounds or are also written like they do in French which it’s a bit weird but at the same time really nice and it probably will make the whole process a lot easier that it already is.
For the next meeting we will probably make some Italian food, at my place since even my girlfriend is learning Italian and so sometimes I’ll have to jump between four languages: English, French, Italian and Finnish! …Piece of cake!