Мы ждали целую вечность.

Ждали is the past tense of ждать (to wait).

It agrees with the subject мы (we), so it takes the plural past form:

• я ждал / ждала = I waited
• ты ждал / ждала = you waited
• мы ждали = we waited

Russian past tense is formed from the infinitive stem plus endings that show gender in the singular and number in the plural.

Ждать is the imperfective verb, and ждали suggests an ongoing, extended situation: we were waiting / we waited.

That fits well with целую вечность (a whole eternity), because the sentence emphasizes how long the waiting felt.

Compare:

• Мы ждали целую вечность. = We waited for ages / We were waiting forever.
• Мы подождали немного. = We waited a little bit.

The perfective подождать is more about waiting for a limited period or seeing the action as complete. Here, the feeling of drawn-out duration makes ждали the natural choice.

Literally, it means a whole eternity.

This is an idiomatic exaggeration, just like in English:

• We waited an eternity
• We waited forever
• We waited ages

So the Russian sentence is not usually meant literally. It expresses that the wait felt extremely long.

Because вечность is the direct object-like expression here and is in the accusative case.

The noun:

• вечность = eternity

It is a feminine noun, and for this kind of feminine noun, the accusative singular looks like the nominative:

• вечность → вечность

But the adjective целый must also agree with it:

• nominative feminine: целая
• accusative feminine: целую

So:

• целая вечность = a whole eternity (dictionary/basic form)
• ждали целую вечность = waited a whole eternity

In this sentence, целую вечность expresses the duration of the waiting, and Russian commonly uses the accusative for duration of time.

Similar patterns:

• ждать целый час = to wait a whole hour
• спать всю ночь = to sleep all night
• работать целый день = to work all day

So целую вечность is in the accusative because it answers the question for how long?

Good question. Ждать can be tricky.

In modern Russian, when you are waiting for someone or something specific, both accusative and genitive can appear, depending on the noun and usage patterns:

• ждать поезд
• ждать поезда
• ждать друга
• ждать друга (same form here)

But in Мы ждали целую вечность, вечность is not the thing being waited for. It expresses duration, not the object of waiting. So this is a different structure: how long we waited, not what we waited for.

No, Russian often drops subject pronouns when they are clear from the verb form or context.

So you could also say:

• Ждали целую вечность.

That can still mean We waited forever, depending on context.

However, мы may be included:

• for clarity
• for emphasis
• to contrast with someone else

For example:

• Мы ждали целую вечность, а они пришли поздно.
  We waited forever, and they arrived late.

Yes. Russian word order is flexible, and changing it can shift emphasis.

Neutral order:

• Мы ждали целую вечность.

Possible variations:

• Целую вечность мы ждали. = emphasizes the length of time
• Ждали мы целую вечность. = can sound more expressive or contrastive

The basic meaning stays the same, but the focus changes depending on what the speaker wants to highlight.

Russian often expresses duration without a preposition.

English says:

• for an hour
• for a whole eternity

Russian simply uses the accusative:

• час
• целую вечность

So Russian does not need a separate word corresponding to English for in this kind of time expression.

Yes. Вечность is a common exaggeration in colloquial speech.

Examples:

• Я тебя целую вечность не видел. = I haven’t seen you in ages.
• Мы стояли там целую вечность. = We stood there forever.
• Это длилось вечность. = It lasted forever.

So the sentence sounds natural and expressive, not strange or overly formal.

A careful pronunciation is roughly:

My zhDA-li TSE-lu-yu VYECH-nast'

A few notes:

• Мы sounds like my but shorter and with a Russian ы sound
• ждали = zhDAli, with stress on жда
• целую = TSE-lu-yu, stress on the first syllable
• вечность = VYECH-nast', stress on the first syllable

Stress matters a lot in Russian, so it helps to learn the stressed syllables early.

Yes, depending on context.

Russian past tense does not map one-to-one onto English past tenses.
Мы ждали целую вечность can be translated as:

• We waited forever
• We were waiting forever
• We had been waiting forever

The best English version depends on the surrounding context. Russian itself simply gives you the past action and leaves some of those finer tense distinctions to context.