Thinking about Italian

Hal and I are listening to podcasts to try to learn some basic traveling Italian. We plan to visit Claire in Tuscany in March, and it would be a good idea to learn such important phrases as, "Excuse me, please. Do you speak English?" and "Which way to the restroom?" I am pretty good at repeating the phrases, but I'm not sure how good I'll be at remembering them. Also, the podcasts don't tell you how to interpret the other end of the conversation!