Definitely Starting to Assimilate

I'm working my way through the Assimil language program. Not 100% sure what to make of it yet but I'm starting to see some benefits. For instance, I learned my first grammar rule! This is the bizarre thing about Pimsleur. You have such great speaking abilities but you are a bit like a robot in that you are just repeating certain things back without understanding the rules.

The grammar rule I learned is regarding definite articles. While doing PIM, you kind of just mish mash the definite articles you hear when you repeat them back because they take so many forms and can sound very similar. What's a definite article you ask? In English, "the" is the only definite article and it's used for both singular and plural nouns. Additionally, nouns in English aren't assigned a gender. Well, they are in Italian. Kinda sexist, huh? Leave it to the Italians.

There's a different definite article for each situation (and a few exceptions which follow): 1) feminine singular nouns use "la" (la mano); 2) feminine plural nouns use "le" (le mani); 3) masculine singular nouns use "il" (il bagno); and masculine plural nouns use "i" (i bagni).

But wait, there's more: "lo" is used with masculine singluar nouns beginning with: a) the letter S and followed by consonant (lo scompartimento); b) the letter Z (lo zucchero) or c) a vowel -- but you drop the o and combine l' with the noun (l'operaio). Oh and finally, "gli" is used these same situations a) (gli compartimenti) b (gli operai), and c (gli zucchero).

Easy stuff, huh?!