This is an opening note based on the paper which I delivered for the proceedings of the conference on The Teaching of Amharic in Europe, organized by Dclombera Negga and held in Paris at the Institut national des langues ct civilisations orientalcs (Inalco) on 7-8 January 2009, which, however, have never been published. On 1 February 2018, while welcoming the attendants of the workshop Workshop: Amharisch Untcrrichten in Deutschland/Workshop on the Teaching of Amharic in Germany, held on 1-2 February 2018 at the Hiob Ludolf Centre for Ethiopian Studies,1 I shared and updated some of the considerations 1 had developed, on the basis of my teaching and working experience in Naples and Hamburg.