les coses han anat així
“les coses han anat així” — that is how it went in Catalan. Phrase, level B1. Literally "the things have gone thus": fate summed up. He did not want to leave: that is how it went, that is all. In a live sentence: “No volia marxar: les coses han anat així i prou” — He did not want to leave: that is how it went, that is all. You can hear how it sounds right here. A word from the everyday Catalan course, level B1.
In short
| Written in Catalan | les coses han anat així |
| Translation | that is how it went |
| Part of speech | phrase |
| Level | B1 |
- les coses han anat aixíthat is how it went
Why it looks that way
Literally "the things have gone thus": fate summed up. He did not want to leave: that is how it went, that is all
A word with a story stays in memory longer than one learned as a “spelling — translation” pair: memory holds on to meaning, not to a string.
In a live sentence
A single word almost never appears alone in conversation. A sentence shows where it fits and what stands next to it.
- No volia marxar: les coses han anat així i prouHe did not want to leave: that is how it went, that is all
How not to forget this word
Reading a word and remembering it are different jobs. A day later, little survives of a single reading — and that is not bad memory, that is how memory works.
- This has been tested on foreign words too. The difference shows up most when you test yourself a few days later rather than straight away.checked many timesKim & Webb, 2022, Language Learning 72(2) · 48 experiments, 3,411 participants, 98 comparisons.
- Recalling beats re-reading. Covering the translation and trying to remember it does more than reading it ten more times.checked many timesAdesope, Trevisan & Sundararajan, 2017, Review of Educational Research 87(3) · 188 experiments, 272 comparisons. g = 0.61; against plain re-reading 0.51, against passive review 0.93.
- An answer you worked out yourself sticks better than one handed to you.checked many timesBertsch et al., 2007, Memory & Cognition 35(2) · 86 studies, 445 comparisons, d = 0.40.
Frequently asked
How do you say “that is how it went” in Catalan?
«les coses han anat així». In a live sentence: “No volia marxar: les coses han anat així i prou” — He did not want to leave: that is how it went, that is all. You can hear how it sounds right on this page. Phrase, level B1.
Why does this word look the way it does?
Literally "the things have gone thus": fate summed up. He did not want to leave: that is how it went, that is all. A word with a story stays in memory longer than a “spelling — translation” pair: memory holds on to meaning, not to a string.
Can I hear how this sounds?
Yes, right on this page: click the word and it will play. The sound works on any phone, and nothing needs to be installed.