GRAMMAR DETAIL

〜がたい

extremely difficult to · hard to

Indicates that an action or acceptance is extremely difficult because of emotion or a value judgment.

Examples

長年の努力は忘れがたい。

The years of effort are impossible to forget.

この景色は言葉では表しがたい。

This scenery is difficult to express in words.

恩師から受けた教えは忘れがたい。

The lessons I received from my mentor are impossible to forget.

Structure: がたい follows a verb's masu-stem to express great difficulty in doing or accepting something for emotional or evaluative reasons.
Basic usage: 恩師から受けた教えは忘れがたい。 means that the mentor's lessons remain deeply memorable and hard to forget.

Emotional resistance versus difficulty of operation
- 受け入れがたい提案 is a proposal difficult to accept emotionally or in one's judgment. 開けにくいふた describes difficulty opening a lid; にくい naturally expresses such physical inconvenience.
Inflecting the ending
- The expression directly modifies a noun in 忘れがたい思い出, and takes i-adjective inflection for a past judgment in 受け入れがたかった. The verb portion remains in its stem form.