One of my fellow travelers once asked me who”Louie” was. She said I talked about him a lot with my Italian friends and family. Not knowing the language she didn’t realize that “Louie” was actually spelled “Lui” and referred to the Italian personal pronoun for he or him. So when I would say “Mi piace Lui” I wasn’t saying “I like Louie” by rather saying “I like him”.
Listening to this type of conversation can be confusing for a non-Italian speaker. All the more reason to know a little Italian when traveling in Italy. Phrase book Italian is confining and a little like speaking from a script. Learning vocabulary alone is limited – a “speak and point” version of a language. Although both are good starting points for your first trip to Italy you will need to build on these rout sayings and idioms to carry on a conversation. Remember language is a form of communication with many dimensions and most languages spoken without proper grammar and conjugation won’t make much sense.