Feelings in Romanian: happy, tired, cold, and dor

Romanian talks about feelings in two ways. Most feelings work as in English, with to be and an adjective: sunt fericit (I'm happy). Physical states and some emotions turn the sentence around: mi-e frig (I'm cold) is literally "to me it is cold". Once you see the two patterns, every feeling word slots into one of them.

How are you?

Ce faci? (literally "What are you doing?") is the everyday How are you?, and the essential phrases guide covers the standard answer, Bine, mulțumesc. Here are the other questions and answers you will hear.

• Ce mai faci?

  How are you doing? (tu)

• Cum te simți?

  How do you feel? (tu)

• Foarte bine.

  Very well.

• Merge.

  It's going OK.

• Nu prea bine.

  Not so good.

Ce mai faci? adds mai (still, again) and suggests How have you been? to someone you have not seen for a while. With someone you address politely, the forms are Ce mai faceți? and Cum vă simțiți?.

I'm happy, I'm tired: sunt + adjective

For most feelings, Romanian uses a fi (to be) and an adjective, as English does. The adjective agrees with the person: a man says sunt obosit, a woman sunt obosită.

• fericit

  happy

• trist

  sad

• obosit

  tired

• supărat

  upset, cross

• nervos

  irritable, angry

• îngrijorat

  worried

• bolnav

  ill

• emoționat

  excited, nervous, moved

Two of these are worth a closer look. Nervos is a false friend: it mostly means irritable or angry, not nervous. For pre-exam nerves, Romanians say sunt emoționat or am emoții. And supărat covers a range from upset to annoyed: Sunt supărat pe tine means I'm cross with you.

Cold, hungry, scared: mi-e

Physical states and some feelings work differently. Romanian does not say I am cold; it says to me it is cold, with the small pronoun mi (to me) and e (is). Together they are spoken as one syllable, "mye".

• Mi-e frig./mje frig/

  I'm cold.

• Mi-e cald.

  I'm hot.

• Mi-e foame.

  I'm hungry.

• Mi-e sete.

  I'm thirsty.

• Mi-e somn.

  I'm sleepy.

• Mi-e frică.

  I'm scared.

To talk about someone else, only the pronoun changes:

I like it: îmi place

Îmi place works the same way: literally it pleases me. The thing you like is the subject, so the verb is plural when the thing is: Îmi place muzica (I like music), Îmi plac florile (I like flowers).

• Îmi place.

  I like it.

• Nu-mi place.

  I don't like it.

• Îmi pare rău.

  I'm sorry.

• Te iubesc.

  I love you.

Îmi pare rău (literally "it seems bad to me") is how you say sorry for something sad or for a mistake; Îmi pare bine, its opposite, is what you say when you meet someone.

Dor: missing someone

• dor/dor/

  longing, missing someone or something

• Mi-e dor de tine.

  I miss you.

• Mi-e dor de casă.

  I miss home.

Dor is the feeling of missing a person, a place or a time you love. Many Romanians consider it one of the most characteristic words of the language, and it runs through folk songs and poetry. Grammatically it follows the mi-e pattern: mi-e dor de tine (I miss you), ți-e dor de mine? (do you miss me?). Dor de ducă is the restless urge to travel.

Showing you care

Further reading

• dor on dexonline (opens in a new tab), the entry for dor in the free online dictionary of Romanian, with its meanings and expressions.
• dexonline (opens in a new tab), for any other feeling word.
• Institutul Limbii Române (opens in a new tab), the Romanian Language Institute.