"It's been more than three years, Dear"

Question

please help me to find the meaning of "its been more than three years dear"

Answer 1

"Han pasado más de tres años, querido(a)"

thanx a lot my friend.. - dave_sir, May 2, 2010

Answer 2

Han pasado más de tres años is wrong you do not use present perfecto when referring to such a time scale you could use preterite but you don't say exactly what has been three years, if you mean it has been three years since you have seen each other I would say: Hace más que tres años que nos vemos then tag your endearment on the end of that.

I assure you that "han pasado más de tres años" is a perfectly common and sensible thing to say in Spanish. I invite you to do a quick search for "Han pasado más de..." in Google, and you will find plenty of legitimate examples. - Gekkosan, May 3, 2010

Gekkosan it is not the way I am being taught by spanish teachers here in Barcelona but perhaps I have missed a point somewhere in class I will research it further anyway don't you think "hace más que tres años que" is a better choice of phrase.g - kenwilliams, May 3, 2010

By all means, do the research, and please share your findings with us. It would be interesting to see the technical reasons why this is so, if you find them. Meanwhile, all I can say is that "han pasado más de tres años" sounds more natural to me. - Gekkosan, May 3, 2010

Answer 3

Hacido mas que tres años querid(o/a).

Sorry, no. That doesn't work, - Gekkosan, May 3, 2010

Andrew there is no such word as hacido, hacer is a iregular verb and the past participle is hecho not hacido and as Gekkosan said it doesn't work in this case. - kenwilliams, May 3, 2010

I think he means "Ha sido," not "hacido." - MacFadden, May 3, 2010

"Ha sido más que tres años" doesn't work either, MacFadden. You *could* say: "Han sido tan sólo tres años"; perhaps. But that's the opposite meaning to Dave's quote. - Gekkosan, May 3, 2010

Answer 4

Han pasado más de tres años is wrong you do not use present perfecto when referring to such a time scale you could use preterite

Ken, do you realize Gekko is a native?

Anyway, your reasoning works for English, but not for Spanish. We use present perfect all the time for past events.

With all due respect to Gekko I do not accept that because someone is a native that they are automatically gramatical experts, I am native english but I don't assume to be an expert on english grammer indeed I hold no A levels on the subject but I hear my - kenwilliams, May 4, 2010

fellow countrymen using bad grammer all the time. - kenwilliams, May 4, 2010

Anyway I didn't say that the use of present perfecto was wrong but the linking of it with 3 years or even with yesterday. - kenwilliams, May 4, 2010

Answer 5

And this is priceless

Thread example sentences of conjugation

Thanks for pointing me to the threads I will study them. - kenwilliams, May 4, 2010

Oh - my -God! Indeed, Lazarus is THE man! The Master of the Verb. Amaaaazing! I know they tried hard to teach me all that stuff at school... - Gekkosan, May 4, 2010

..., and they succeeded to the point where I can use all the forms shown by Lazarus. But give them names!? Forget it! "Plu-Perfect"?? I don't remember having heard that term ever before in my life! This has been truly enlightening! ¡Gracias, Heidita! - Gekkosan, May 4, 2010

Answer 6

Ken, I like and appreciate the fact that you are really serious about this question, and are taking the time to research it. I will respond in the same vein.

I am certainly not a grammar expert (and it is "grammar", not "grammer", for the record), so I do not have the technical arguments to reply to your question. I do, however, consider myself a reasonably competent user of my language, and I can tell you empirically and emphatically that the form we are discussing is commonly and amply used, and as far as I am able to tell, it is not incorrect.

You wrote:

"He navigado a las islas Baleares hace tres años and that is how you used it in your example Gekkosan."

("navegado", not "navigado", by the way).

I disagree. That quote is not correct Spanish, and it does not faithfully follow the structure I used, which in this case would have been: "Han pasado tres años desde que navegué por las islas Baleares."

Other examples using that construction:

"Han sido ustedes quienes causaron el problema".

"Desde que tengo uso de la razón se han estado cociendo habas en este departamento."

"Vamos a cerrar el bar porque los clientes le han estado faltando el respeto a las camareras".

Does it make any sense stated this way?

Unfortunately I don't have the time to do a deep research on the reasons why this works in Spanish. I can only hope that one of the Forum's academic will be willing to step up and illustrate us.

Thanks for the interesting and stimulating follow up, Ken.

Thanks Gekkosan and forgive me for continually spelling grammar incorrectly as for the navegado well that was just a typo, thanks again. - kenwilliams, May 4, 2010

Thank you, Ken. Like I said, I am not an expert in grammar, and I enjoy opportunities like this to explore areas of the language that I have always simply taken for granted. - Gekkosan, May 4, 2010

Answer 7

Anyway I didn't say that the use of present perfecto was wrong but the linking of it with 3 years or even with yesterday. - kenwilliams

I am just teaching the same thing to my students, Ken, and trust me, they are having a tough time understanding that you cannot use present perfect with a marked time in the past,

Have a look what it says:

Cuando no aparece ningún marcador temporal, se suele utilizar el pretérito perfecto"

We usually use, but we don't have to use like in English

Actually, here in Madrid we use the present perfect for almost everything.

He comido ayer con Pepe. Ah sí? Pues sí, esta vez hemos comido en un chino....

And a long etc. We usually use the present perfect for something that happened not so long ago,

He hablado con pepa hace solo unos minutos,

So my poor students think the difference between the two tenses is that one (past simple) is more in the past than the other one (present perfect) thus say:

I have spoken with Pepa five minutes ago.

But

I was in Egypt once..

As you can see, they have the bigger problem in my opinion, as English applies the rules much stricter in this case, and you simply cannot use either tense, which you can in Spanish,

Please have a look at this thread, view Ian and Lazarus, he is a grammar specialist.

Answer 8

I would love to know what - Han pasado más de tres años,

Answer 9

Further to my researching I quote from my school textbook: "Los marcadores temporales condicionan el uso de pretérito perfecto o pretérito indefinado" " Ya y todavía son marcadores que suelen acompañar al pretérito perfecto". "Cuando no aparece ningún marcador temporal, se suele utilizar el pretérito perfecto" Now using this last "marcador temporal" I can say He navigado de Barcelona a las islas Baleares cuatro veces but it would be wrong to say,He navigado a las islas Baleares hace tres años and that is how you used it in your example Gekkosan. Here are some examples of marcadores temporales used with pret perfecto:esta tarde, hoy, nunca, esta semana, hace un rato, alguna vez etc. and here are some marcadores that you use with pret indefinado, esa semana, el mes pasado, ayer, en febrero, 1998, esa tarde, hace tres años, etc. Everything above is statements of fact but having said all that I may have interpreted the facts mistakenly if I am proven wrong I hold my hand up, but don't dismiss it by saying we normally say that as there are a lot of things that we normally say but that doesn't make them correct and I am not saying that is wrong it may be said in everyday speech but is it a 100% gramatically correct? after all I am led to believe that the name of the game on this site is correct grammer.

Answer 10

Han pasado mas de tres anos.