彼の家を見つけるのに苦労した。

Sentence Discussions Japanese
#1
English Translation

I had a hard time finding his house.

is 困る an appropriate synonym for 苦労する?

#2

@ericaw
苦労する is not always interchangeable with 困る mainly for two reasons: 1) grammatical structure and 2) different connotations.

  1. Correct: 彼の家を見つけるのに苦労した (lit. It took significant time and/or efforts to find his house.)
  1. Incorrect: 彼の家を見つけるのに困った
  1. Correct: 彼の家を見つけられなくて困った or 見つけられず困った (lit. I had a hard time because I wasn’t able to find his house.)

The second sentence is grammatically broken. We just don’t say that.

The first and third sentences are both correct grammatically, but they don’t always mean the same. The first sentence apparently suggests that the speaker finally found the house. But the third one might or might not mean that the speaker gave up.

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