Learn French: La visite chez ma tante était trop longue. - The visit to my aunt's was too long.

La visite chez ma tante était trop longue.

The visit to my aunt's was too long.

Breakdown of La visite chez ma tante était trop longue.

Questions & Answers about La visite chez ma tante était trop longue.

Why do we use chez here instead of à?

In French, you use the preposition chez to mean 'at the home of' or 'to the home of' a person. You use à for places, like à la maison (at the house), but you must use chez before a person's name or title, like chez ma tante.

Why is the verb était in the imperfect tense rather than the passé composé (a été)?

The imperfect tense is used here because you are describing a state of being or setting a scene in the past. You are describing the ongoing quality of the visit (it was too long) rather than a specific, sudden action.

Does trop longue mean the same thing as très longue?

No, they have different meanings. Très longue means 'very long', which is just a fact. Trop longue means 'too long', which expresses a complaint or a negative feeling that it lasted more time than it should have.

Why does the adjective longue have a 'u' in it?

The adjective must agree with the feminine noun la visite, so it needs to be feminine. The masculine form is long. To make it feminine, you add -ue instead of just -e to protect the hard 'g' sound. If you just added an 'e', the word would change pronunciation and end in a soft 'j' sound.