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ITALIAN WORD OF THE DAY

Italian expression of the day: ‘Ci ha messo una vita’

It won't take you a lifetime to master this simple phrase.

Italian expression of the day ci ha messo una vita
Photo: Annie Spratt/Unsplash/Nicolas Raymond

From completing a simple bureaucratic task at the comune to waiting for the bus, sometimes it feels like things can take forever in Italy.

Fittingly, there’s a phrase for that: Ci ha messo una vita (chee-ah-MESS-oh-oo-nah-VEE-ta). It translates literally as ‘it took a lifetime’, or as we’d be more likely to say in English, ‘it took forever’. 

L’autobus ci ha messo una vita ad arrivare.
The bus took forever to get here.

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Ci ha messo una vita can mean ‘it took forever’ or ‘it took him/her forever’ – the meaning is understood from context.

Ci ha messo una vita per chiederle di uscire.
It took him forever to ask her out.

Sono appena uscita dalla banca, ci ha messo una vita.
I just got out of the bank, it took forever.

The messo (past participle of mettere) stays the same regardless of the sentence subject – but you can conjugate the avere differently depending on your subject to say ‘it took me/you/them/us forever’.

Ci ho messo una vita a risparmiare per questa vacanza.
It took me forever to save up for this holiday.

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Ci hai messo una vita a fare la doccia.
You took forever in the shower.

Ci hanno messo una vita ad alzarsi.
It took them ages to get up.

You’ll notice that the phrase can be followed by either or per directly before the verb, and the expression doesn’t just work with una vita – you can switch that out for any time period, from a minute to a week to a year.

Ho fatto una domanda al comune e ci hanno messo un mese a rispondere.
I wrote to the comune and it took them one month to get back to me.

Ci abbiamo messo una settimana per trovare le piastrelle che volevi.
It took us a week to find the tiles you wanted.

You’re not restricted to the past tense: ci mette (along with the slightly more common ci vuole) can mean ‘it takes’ when followed by any time duration, and can also be conjugated in the future tense.

Ha detto che ci mette un’ora per arrivare in centro con l’autobus.
She said it takes an hour to get to the centre by bus.

Ci metterai 5 minuti per riscaldare gli avanzi che ti ho lasciato in frigorifero.
It’ll take you 5 minutes to heat up the leftovers I left in the fridge for you.

Have a go at mastering all the different variations of this phrase – we bet it won’t take you long!

Do you have an Italian word you’d like us to feature? If so, please email us with your suggestion.

Member comments

  1. Living in Italy, alas, is not in my future. However, speaking Italian fluidly is a goal I’m getting ever closer to, which is why I love the Italian Word of the Day. It’s always so useful and usually something that doesn’t crop up in all the other tools I’m using to learn this gorgeous language.

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ITALIAN WORD OF THE DAY

Italian word of the day: ‘Rimorchiare’

Here's an Italian word you'll want to pick up.

Italian word of the day: 'Rimorchiare'

If you’ve ever studied for your foglio rosa (provisional driver’s licence) exam in Italy, you’re sure to have come across the word rimorchio (trailer).

Theory test T/F question: ‘The width of the trailer must never exceed that of the vehicle pulling it.’

Credo che dovremo noleggiare un rimorchio per trasportare tutta la merce.
I think we might need to rent a trailer to transport all the goods.

And rimorchiare, along with the more formal trainare, means to haul or tow.

La barca è stata rimorchiata a riva.
The boat was towed to shore.

But rimorchiare isn’t just used to talk about vehicles. It also means to pick or chat someone up, or hook up with them.

Sono usciti per rimorchiare.
They’ve gone out on the pull.

Se n’è appena andata con un tipo che ha rimorchiato.
She just left with some guy she picked up.

A rimorchiatore is a tugboat, but can also mean a player/persistent flirt, and rimorchione/a also describes someone who’s constantly chatting people up.

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In some parts of the country, meanwhile, you might hear someone described as a provolone – a big tryhard or wannabe player.

That’s a wordplay based on the reflexive verb provarci, meaning ‘to try it on with’, and the famous Italian cheese. 

È un gran provolone ma non riesce mai a rimorchiare.
He’s a real tryhard but he never manages to pull.

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