Feia dies que volia parlar amb la professora.

I had been wanting to speak with the teacher for days.

Breakdown of Feia dies que volia parlar amb la professora.

• voler: to want
• amb: with
• parlar: to speak
• el professor: the teacher

Questions & Answers about Feia dies que volia parlar amb la professora.

Why does the sentence start with feia dies? What does that literally mean?

Feia dies is a very common Catalan time expression. Literally, it is something like it was making days, but that literal wording is not how English works.

In real usage, fer + time expression + que + verb means something like:

• for ...
• ... ago that
• had been ... since
• for some time

So in this sentence, Feia dies que... means it had been days that..., which natural English usually turns into I had wanted... for days or I’d been wanting... for days.

It is an idiomatic structure, so it is best to learn feia dies que as a chunk.

Why is it feia and not fa?

Because the sentence is talking about a situation in the past.

• fa = present tense of fer
• feia = imperfect past of fer

Compare:

• Fa dies que vull parlar amb la professora.
  = I’ve wanted / I’ve been wanting to talk to the teacher for days.
  This connects the situation to the present.

• Feia dies que volia parlar amb la professora.
  = I had wanted / I’d been wanting to talk to the teacher for days.
  This places the whole situation in the past.

So feia is used because the speaker is looking back on that period.