bitful

Quanti telefonini hai?
How many mobile phones have you got?
Literally: 'How-many mini-telephones (you) have?'

Things may have changed now, but last time I lived in Italy (2001) it was not uncommon for people to have two or more mobile phone numbers.

Sometimes I would see them carry more than one handset. Sometimes they would only use one phone but keep a couple of extra SIM cards in their wallet (one with a cheap day calling rate, another that is more convenient at night, and a special one just to conduct extra-marital affairs, run shady deals or carry on business for that second and third unofficial, undeclared black economy jobs.

Io ne ho tre, ma ne uso solo uno.
I have got three, but only use one.
Literally: 'I of-them have three, but of-them (I) use only one'.

If you want to find out more

'Ne' can roughly be translated as 'of it' or 'of them'. It is used to replace a word that has previously been mentioned. It is placed before the action that refers to it, for example 'Ne voglio poco' = 'I want a little (of it)'.

Mobile phone can be translated in Italian with either 'cellulare' or 'telefonino'. Telefonino literally means 'small telephone' and is perhaps more widely used and slightly more colloquial.

This entry was posted on Saturday, February 16th, 2008 at 11:42 pm and last modified on February 17th, 2008 at 11:17 am, and is filed under italian. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.