After the enthusiasm of the morning when they arrived, Paolo can't sleep because he thinks he's a failure and wishes he could change his life. Maura tries to comfort him, but she also has some news.

Paolo enjoys composing songs with his friend, Fabrizio, to distract himself, while Maura, pregnant with their second child, puts little Elisabetta to bed. When the baby is born, at the hospital, friends joke about the heir and Paolo's steady job.

Paolo skips work because he wants to dedicate himself to what he really likes to do. When Faber invites him to perform, at first Maura seems annoyed but in the end she supports him.

Paolo, after a show, receives a proposal from an impresario to perform in his theater. Later, at the company Christmas dinner, he is given the task of organizing the exchanging of gifts, but he uses the occasion to tell those gathered what he really thinks.

After the company Christmas dinner is over, Paolo returns to Maura, who seems almost relieved that it went badly. For Christmas Eve dinner, the two join the children at the grandparents' house, but an inevitable conversation awaits Paolo.

While Paolo's parents are yelling at Paolo, Maura enters the room to defend her husband's creativity and ask her in-laws to encourage him. They are not having any of it. Paolo does go back to work, but with a new attitude.

Confindustria is the main trade association for Italy's manufacturing and service sectors. This inspirational video was produced for its annual meeting, and Italian luminaries from Marco Polo to Renzo Piano are invoked to tell the story of Italian innovation.

The Italian Alps are a pretty spectacular spot to learn the basics of snowboarding. Matteo and his two very capable students show us the ropes.

Daniela explains how some adverbs, depending on how they are used, will be regular or irregular in the comparative form.

Daniela discusses how journalists and the mass media often tack on -issimo to nouns and adverbial expressions, something which is not strictly correct but is prevalent nonetheless.

Daniela explains what are called "indefinite modes." They are indefinite because they don't refer directly to a person or object. They commonly occur in a subordinate clause, and we need the context of the main clause to give us that information. There are three forms: the infinitive, the past participle, and the gerund.

In Italian, there's not only a past participle, as in English, there is also a present participle. Many nouns and adjectives we use every day come from this tense, as well as from the past participle.

In this segment, Daniela talks about the gerund. As you will see, in Italian, the gerund is often used by itself, whereas in English we need an extra word before it — a conjunction or preposition. We are on more familiar ground when Daniela talks about using a gerund with the verb stare (to be) to form what we call the present continuous or present progressive.

Daniela gives us some more examples of gerunds used in subordinate clauses. Asking ourselves what questions the gerund answers can help us understand its role in a sentence.

After summing up about the passive voice, Daniela goes on to talk about some other related constructions. It's important to remember that the passive is formed with transitive verbs only. But when we don't have a named subject or agent, we have a few other ways to make a sentence passive-like. One way uses the famous particella (particle) si. Si is used for so many things in Italian that it is bound to create confusion for learners, even advanced learners. Don't worry, part 3 of the lesson will explain further. Another way uses the verb andare (to go) to indicate something that must be done. Here too, the stress is on the action, not the subject or agent.