3 Tips for learning Italian (or any language)
July 08, 2011I’ve shared my top 3 tips for learning languages on Dianne Hales’ wonderful blog, Becoming Italian Word by Word. If you’ve learned a language, do you agree with any of these tips?
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My Italy student exchange: 4 things I wish I’d known
June 17, 2011Two decades ago this month, I was on the plane on my way back to Canada after a year abroad on an Italy student exchange program with AFS. I’ve since spent five of the last 20 years living and…
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Five favorite books for travelers to Italy or Italophiles
December 16, 2010The five recommendations below are all on my bookshelf. They are the ones I pick up frequently: the ones bookmarked with color-coded sticky flags, and the ones that I buy again and again as gifts for people. For…
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Meet the locals, but share your perspective, too
October 25, 2010Mingling with locals definitely brings a foreign destination to life, but there's one thing no local has: your perspective. They will never know that you love cobblestones unless you tell them. When I was in high school, our…
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A traveler’s guide to strikes in Italy
August 10, 2010I mentioned to my mom recently that I was relieved my clients were going to miss the scheduled national train strike. My mom, a very seasoned traveler who has actually been to Italy several times under my care, was completely…
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Renting a car in Italy: should you or shouldn’t you?
July 13, 2010[This is an excerpt from our Driving in Italy ebook, which you can download for free here. Having a car on your Italian vacation can be an expensive hassle, or it can be a means to more independence and a…
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Five favorite Italian words
May 03, 2010I was tagged by Melanie at the Italofile blog to write a post about five of my favorite Italian words, which I thought would be a lot of fun. So here they are, plus the reasons I picked them: Via!…
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Picnics in Italy
April 23, 2010The photo above was a picnic for about 20 people that we organized at a farmhouse in Tuscany. We just knocked on the door and asked the owners if we could use their back yard and it worked well. Picnicking…
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Italian language learning tip: notice Italian signs
February 05, 2010Learning a new language is a bit like detective work at first. You can memorize the grammar rules and a list of vocabulary and practice your accent, but those things are only useful when implemented in communication. Once you’ve arrived…
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Write a blog post for Italy Beyond the Obvious
Would you like to write a blog post to be published on Italy Beyond the Obvious? Read this first.
