J'allais m'inscrire = I was enrolling?

Question

Le lendemain, j'allais m'inscrire à l'université.The day after, I was enrolling at university.
The next day, I was enrolling at university.
Shouldn't this be 'I was going to enrol at university'?Or 'je m'inscrivais..?'

Accepted Answer

Bonjour Joy,
You can have ‘aller (Imparfait)+ infinitive’ to talk about an event in the past which was going to happen / was near completion.

‘J’allais m’inscrire’ can be translated by either:
I was enrolling → in the sense of it hadn’t happened yet but it is a sure thing / a fact
I was going to enrol → in the sense of it hadn’t happened yet but it is near

J’ai dit à mon mari que j’allais arrêter de fumer
→ I said to my husband I was stopping smoking → a fact
→ I said to my husband I was going to stop smoking → not yet happened

I hope this is helpful.
Bonne journée !

Answer

Hi Joy,Aller + infinitive is a near-future construction.Le lendemain tells us that an historic event is being described. So my take on this would be to write "Le lendemain, je suis allé (completed action) m'inscire" which would express "The next day I went to enrol ....."   (Where Je is male otherwise Je suis allée)Hope this helps.Jim