Une soirée mouvementée (Passé Composé with être)

AndreaB2Kwiziq community member

Une soirée mouvementée (Passé Composé with être)

The 1st sentence in this fill-in-the-blank quiz was " Laissez-moi vous raconter ce qu'il nous........" Translated as, "Let me tell you what happened to us! My response was conjugated to Nous, and so, "sommes arrivés" was incorrect.  Should I have conjugated the answer with moi, the subject of the verb? The correct answer was "est arrivé" . Could you please explain why IL became the subject?    Thanks.

This question relates to:French lesson "Conjugate coming and going verbs (+ être) in the compound past in French (Le Passé Composé)"
Asked 4 years ago
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AlanC1 Kwiziq Q&A super contributor Correct answer

Arriver doesn't just mean "to arrive", it also has some figurative meanings. "Il arrive" using an impersonal "il" means "it happens", and "il nous arrive" would mean "it happens to us". In this case "nous" is the object, not the subject of the verb. Therefore "ce qu'il nous est arrivé" means "what happened to us".

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Andrea asked:View original

Une soirée mouvementée (Passé Composé with être)

The 1st sentence in this fill-in-the-blank quiz was " Laissez-moi vous raconter ce qu'il nous........" Translated as, "Let me tell you what happened to us! My response was conjugated to Nous, and so, "sommes arrivés" was incorrect.  Should I have conjugated the answer with moi, the subject of the verb? The correct answer was "est arrivé" . Could you please explain why IL became the subject?    Thanks.

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