Category: "Dolgo"
Идти
The next generic verb of motion is идти. Note especially its irregular past tense forms.
| to go | |
| Imperfective | |
| Infinitive | идти |
| Past | шёл шла шло шли |
| Present | иду идёшь идёт идём идёте идут |
| Future |
буду идти будешь идти будет идти будем идти будете идти будут идти |
| Imperative | иди(те) |
Идти is more specialized than ходить in that it always talks about motion in progress toward a particular place. Because of that “in progress” bit, we can often translate it as “heading to” or “on the way to”:
| — Куда ты идёшь? | “Where are you going? |
| — Иду в библиотеку. | “I'm going to the library.” |
| “I'm on my way to the library.” | |
| “I'm heading to the library.” |
Although adverbs of frequency and phrases of frequency (like часто and каждый день) usually trigger an indeterminate verb, if the situation describes something that happens regularly on the way to a place, then you use the determinate verb идти:
| Каждое утро, когда я шёл мимо газетного киоска, Нина Петровна здоровалась со мной. | Every morning, when I passed by the newspaper stand, Nina Petrovna said ‘hello’ to me. |
| Когда я иду в библиотеку, по пути я всегда покупаю мороженое у Лены. | Whenеver I go to the library, I always by ice cream from Lena on the way. |
| Когда ты будешь идти по улице Плеханова, ты увидишь справа электростанцию. | When you walk down Plekhanov street, you will spot a power plant on the right. |
One of the curious uses of determinate verbs is that they can be used to say how long it takes to get to a place. From the English-speaking point of view, that is rather odd. After all, getting to the place implies a completed action, so we should use a perfective verb, right? But from the Russian point of view in these sentences they are indicating how long the process takes, so the imperfective works:
| Я шёл до института двадцать минут. | It took me twenty minutes to get to the institute. |
| Как долго будем идти от дома до почты? | How long will it take us to get to the post office from home? |
| — Долго идти от школы до парка? — Нет, недолго, всего минут десять. |
“Does it take long to get from the school from the park?” “No, not too long, only about ten minutes.” |
Долго
The word долго means “for a long time,” but it's not the same as давно. Now here is a subtle bit. If an activity has been going on for a long time, but you don't really think of it in terms of starting “a long time ago,” then you use долго instead of давно:
| Мы с братом долго говорили о его новой квартире. | My brother and I talked about his new apartment for a long time. |
| Мы будем долго работать в Архангельске. | We are going to be working in Arkhangelsk for a long time. |
| Приходится сегодня вечером долго учиться. Завтра будет экзамен, и я абсолютно ничего не знаю. | I'll have to study for a long time this evening. Tomorrow is the exam, and I know absolutely nothing. |
Some people will sloppily translate a sentence like «Мы долго ехали из Москвы во Владивосток» word for word as “We were riding from Moscow to Vladivostok for a long time,” but it's better to paraphrase the sentence thus: “It took a long time to go from Moscow to Vladivostok.” Other examples:
| Мы долго строили дом. | It took us a long time to build the house. |
| Мы долго будем разбираться в этой ситуации. | It will take us a long time to figure out this situation. |
It's possible to find долго and давно in similar-looking past tense sentences, but their meanings are quite distinct:
| Мы давно жили в Москве. | We lived in Moscow a long time ago. |
| Мы долго жили в Москве. | We lived in Moscow for a long time. |
| Витя давно служил на подводной лодке. | Victor served on a submarine a long time ago. |
| Витя долго служил на подводной лодке. | Victor served on a submarine for a long time. |