What time does the train leave? How long does it take? How much does a ticket cost? These are all essential questions if you want to make your way around Italy on public transport. Find out how to buy tickets and ask for travel information in episode 32 of 5 minute Italian.
To help you remember what you learnt in today's lesson, below you'll find bonus materials like word lists, quizzes and flashcards. But first...
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Bonus Materials
Remember and practice using what you learnt with the bonus materials for today's episode.
Today's Italian words
Quanto costa = how much
Un biglietto = a ticket
per Bologna = to Bologna (literally: for Bologna)
Regionale o intercity? = the regional train or the intercity train?
Il regionale = a train which stops at all the little stops on the way. It’s the slowest, but also the cheapest.
L’intercity = An intercity train which goes directly between cities. It’s faster and a bit more expensive than the regional trains.
Freccia trains = long distance trains. They’re the fastest and also the most expensive. If you want to learn the differences between the different types: frecciarossa, frecciabianca, frecciargento, check out this fab guide: What are Italian trains like?
Quanto costa = how much does it cost?
Quanto costa il treno? = how much does the train cost?
Otto euro = eight euros
Quanto tempo ci mette? = how long does it take?
Quanto tempo = how long
Ci mette = it takes
Quaranta minuti = 40 minutes
E il regionale? = and the regional train?
Costa cinque euro e ci mette un’ora = it costs five euros and it takes an hour
Va bene, prendo il regionale, grazie = OK, I’ll take the regional train, thanks
A che ora parte il treno? = What time does the train leave?
Alle sette = at seven
Tra venti minuti = in twenty minutes
Take the Quiz!
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Click here to take the quiz for this episode: How to ask for travel information in Italian
Italian flashcards
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Transcript
Please note, this is not a word for word transcript.
Katie: What time does the train leave? How long does it take? How much does a ticket cost? These are all essential questions if you want to make your way around Italy on public transport. Find out how to buy tickets and ask for travel information in episode 32 of 5 minute Italian.
K: Ciao a tutti e benvenuti a 5 minute Italian. Ciao a tutti e benvenuti a 5 minute Italian, hi everyone and welcome to 5 minute Italian. I’m Katie…
M: And I’m Matteo. Ciao.
K: And in today’s lesson, you’ll learn how to ask for important travel information, like “what time does the train leave” and “how long does it take?”. Listen to this conversation at the ticket counter. We’ll take you through it step by step after.
K: Quanto costa un biglietto per Bologna?
M: Regionale o intercity?
K: Quanto costa l’intercity?
M: Otto euro.
K: Quanto tempo ci mette?
M: Quaranta minuti.
K: e il regionale?
M: Costa cinque euro e ci mette un’ora.
K: Va bene, prendo il regionale, grazie. A che ora parte il treno?
M: Alle sette, tra venti minuti.
K: You first heard the question:
M: Quanto costa un biglietto per Bologna?
K: Which means “how much does a ticket for Bologna cost?” Quanto means “how much”, costa means “costs”, un biglietto means "ticket" and per Bologna means “for Bologna”. Literally, “how much costs a ticket for Bologna”.
M: Quanto costa un biglietto per Bologna?
K: Bologna is a very pretty town in the North East of Italy not far from where I went to university. If you get the chance to visit at some point I highly recommend it. And it has this strange gn sound in it, if you want more information on how to pronounce it, you can check out episode 6 on how to pronounce gn in Italian. Next, you heard:
M: Regionale o intercity?
K: There are loads of different trains in Italy, and the system can be a bit baffling even to natives. Regionale means regional, and they’re the trains which stop at all the stops, so they’re usually the slowest, but also the cheapest. Then you’ve got intercity, which goes directly from city to city, and is a bit faster. You’ll also see freccia trains, which are very fast and therefore the most expensive.
M: If you’ve got a long journey, say from Milan to Rome, the freccia trains can be very handy, but if it’s only a short journey, I’d recommend the regionale, you can blend in with the locals and save money at the same time.
K: You can see the names and definitions of these trains written in the show notes. Next, you heard:
M: Quanto costa l’intercity?
K: Which means “how much does the intercity cost?” Then you heard:
M: Otto euro.
K: Which means 8 euros. Then you heard a really useful question:
M: Quanto tempo ci mette?
K: Which means “how long does it take?”. Quanto means “how much”, tempo means “time”, so quanto tempo means “how much time”. Then you heard ci mette, which means something like “it takes”. It’s useful to memorise this all together as a fixed phrase.
M: Quanto tempo ci mette?
K: Then you heard
M: Quaranta minuti.
K: Did you get how long? Quaranta minuti means forty minutes. Then you heard:
M: e il regionale?
K: e means “and” so e il regionale means “and the regional train?” Then you heard the reply. See if you can hear how much it costs and how long it takes.
M: Costa cinque euro e ci mette un’ora.
K: Did you get that? Costa cinque euro: “it costs five euros” e ci mette un ora. We know that ci mette means it takes, so ci mette un ora = it takes an hour. Then you heard:
M: Va bene, prendo il regionale, grazie.
K: So here we meet again the word va bene which means “OK”, then we’ve got prendo, which we’ve learnt in previous episodes means “I take” and Italians use it to order things, a bit like saying “I’ll have” or “I’ll take” in English. Va bene, prendo il regionale, grazie = OK, I’ll take the regional train, thanks. Then you heard:
M: A che ora parte il treno?
K: Which means “what time does the train leave?” A means “at”, che means “what” and ora means “hour” so to ask “what time”, Italians literally say “at what hour”: a che ora. Then parte means “leave” and il treno means “the train”. Literally: "at what hour leaves the train?"
M: A che ora parte il treno?
K: Finally, see if you can hear what time the train leaves:
M: Alle sette, tra venti minuti
K: Alle sette means “at seven”. Tra means “in” when we’re talking about time, and venti minuti means twenty minutes. So alle sette, tra venti minuti means “at seven, in twenty minutes”.
M: Alle sette, tra venti minuti.
K: If you need some help telling the time in Italian, you can go back and check out episode 31 on how to tell the time in Italian. But for now, let’s listen to the conversation again.
K: Quanto costa un biglietto per Bologna?
M: Regionale o intercity?
K: Quanto costa l’intercity?
M: Otto euro.
K: Quanto tempo ci mette?
M: Quaranta minuti.
K: e il regionale?
M: Costa cinque euro e ci mette un’ora.
K: Va bene, prendo il regionale, grazie. A che ora parte il treno?
M: Alle sette, tra venti minuti.
K: That’s all we have time for today, thanks for listening. And if you’d like to get more mini Italian lessons delivered to your inbox, don’t forget to subscribe by following the link below. Grazie, and ciao for now, see you next time, or as we say in Italian, alla prossima!
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