I'm doing lesson 8.2 and I noticed that Robert says "Come va" to Maria at the beginning of the dialogue.  The "tu" form is used throughout the dialogue so I wondered why it was "Come va" instead of "Come vai."  I googled "come vai" and it doesn't seem to mean "how are you?"   Does "come va" cover formal and informal 2nd person?  Is it just a peculiarity or did I miss something?

Thanks,

Jay

Hi Jay,

Come va? literally means how's it going?, while come vai can be translated as how do you go [...]?

Come vai a scuola?
How do you go to school? (by car, on foot...)
Incidentally this sentence can also be translated as How's school?, "How do you go at school", meaning your grades etc.

Va belongs to the third person singular, vai to the second one. The conjugations for the third singular person are used for the formal You as well:

Come va al lavoro?
How do You [formal, singular] go to work? 
How does he/she go to work?

When asking How are you, you can either say Come va? (both formal and informal) or Come stai? (informal), come sta? (formal). The latter literally translates how are you?.

Hope this helps!

Lucia

Hi Lucia,

I completely forgot the literal translation.  I'm so lost trying to figure out pronouns, I'm forgetting things from lesson 1.1 as well!   Thank you much!  

Jay

Welcome. Keep up the good work!