"We live in the neighborhood on the hill."
Translation:Viviamo nel quartiere sulla collina.
23 CommentsThis discussion is locked.
The difference is whether or not the article is required. If the article is required, it gets glommed on to the back of 'in' as a contraction:
in + il = nel
in + la = nella
Here's a handy chart to study the patterns:
http://italian.about.com/library/fare/blfare153a.htm
219
Are vive and abita (viviamo/ abitiamo) interchangeable in everyday use? It seems to me that vive is more about being alive whereas abita is more about where you live.
Abitare refers to inhabiting or dwelling; you can say "abitare" or "vivere" interchangeably when talking about where you have your home, but only "vivere" has the meaning of being alive too. Note that for animals "abitare" is rarely used.
- 505
Does f.formica's comment mean that by using "abitiamo" instead of "viviamo", the translation with "abitiamo" would be marked wrong because it means a house full of dead people is in the neighborhood on the hill? Mabby has made a good point because "on the hill" shows that the statement is mainly about position rather than liveliness.
Am I wrong? Based on f.formica's post, this observation supports that "abitiamo" is correct. It also seems incredible that IN SEVEN YEARS no one has challenged this translation for this reason.
The abitiamo response is wrong because the end of the sentence is "della collina" ...from the hill, not "sulla", on.
- 505
Heidi's major premise is absent. Also, "della" does not appear in the the exercise. Therefore Heidi's conclusion is questionable and my argument that "abitiamo" is correct stands.
- 1821
Is there anything about the word quartiere that suggests it's masculine? I'm always on the lookout for ways to categorise nouns ending in 'e', but I appreciate that for the most part you just need to learn them.
I don't know that there is a way to tell them apart when they end in 'e', so if there is a helpful hint I would like to know too. Since you're curious, here's a site that lists the the masculine nouns ending in 'a' which is quite irregular ...
http://tutorino.ca/grammatica/2007/7/24/irregular-italian-nouns-1-masculine-nouns-that-end-in-a.html
Are colle and collina interchangeable? I would have thought "collina" refers to a little hill, but that without knowing how big the hill is, either would be perfectly acceptable here.
It's actually the opposite, colle is a smaller hill or an elevated mountain pass between two valleys. Treccani defines the first as "Piccola elevazione di terreno, di altezza intermedia fra l’altura (più bassa) e la collina (più alta)" and the second as "In geografia, depressione altimetrica della cresta di una dorsale montuosa, che mette in comunicazione due valli".
I think you should add 'nelle vicinanze' because in italian 'nel vicinato' is not used. 'vicinato' indicates the people, not a geographical position.
How do we know when to use "in" versus "nel"? I understand how to pull an article into "nel" but what I don't understand is why a moment ago it was "Lui lavora in negozio" but in this sentence it's "Viviamo nel quartiere." Either way, "He works in a store" and "We live in a neighborhood" both utilize the concept of "in."
Related--because this has come up in another sentence--I've also seen "in" used in a sentence with "a."
You know what i always wonder... of you said nella instead of nel, to an italian, would it even matter? Surely they would understand you, but i guess it would just sound weird? Im just interested to know how much it matters/ how mistakes would be perceived, as a native english person its hard for me to imagine.