Learn how to express the past tense
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| INTRODUCTION |
| Nicole: 大家好, 我係 Nicole. (daai6 gaa1 hou2, ngo5 hai6 Nicole.) |
| David: And I’m David. |
| Nicole: And we’re bringing you Absolute Beginner Season 2 lesson 2 - Where in Hong Kong have you been? |
| David: Here at CantoneseClass101.com, the fastest, easiest, and most fun way to learn Cantonese. Nicole, we have a dialog here, what’s it about? |
| Nicole: It’s about… lying. |
| David: It’s about more than that, it’s about betrayal. It’s about friendship that falls on the ground because your friend lies to your face. So the conversation takes place at a campus. |
| Nicole: And it’s between two friends. |
| David: And they’re speaking casual Cantonese, as always. |
| DIALOGUE |
| 你去咗邊呀？ (nei5 heoi3 zo2 bin1 aa3?) |
| “Where did you go?” |
| 幾時？(gei2 si4?) |
| “When?” |
| 頭先。(tau4 sin1.) |
| “Just now.” |
| 冇去邊呀。 (mou5 heoi3 bin1 aa3.) |
| “Nowhere.” |
| POST CONVERSATION BANTER |
| David: I hate it when people lie to your face! |
| Nicole: Where did you go? Nowhere. |
| David: And you saw them leaving... and saw them coming back! |
| Nicole: Yeah. |
| David: Anyway, our vocabulary session today, there is no general theme, but this is really useful stuff that you need to know. So, just get to the vocab session now. |
| VOCAB LIST |
| Nicole: 咗 (zo2) [natural native speed] |
| David: -ed（past tense marker） |
| Nicole: 咗 (zo2) [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Nicole: 咗 (zo2) [natural native speed] |
| Nicole: 幾時 (gei2 si4) [natural native speed] |
| David: when |
| Nicole: 幾時 (gei2 si4) [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Nicole: 幾時 (gei2 si4) [natural native speed] |
| Nicole: 頭先 (tau4 sin1) [natural native speed] |
| David: just now |
| Nicole: 頭先 (tau4 sin1) [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Nicole: 頭先 (tau4 sin1) [natural native speed] |
| Nicole: 冇去邊 (mou5 heoi3 bin1) [natural native speed] |
| David: nowhere |
| Nicole: 冇去邊 (mou5 heoi3 bin1) [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Nicole: 冇去邊 (mou5 heoi3 bin1) [natural native speed] |
| Nicole: 食咗 (sik6 zo2) [natural native speed] |
| David: ate, to have eaten |
| Nicole: 食咗 (sik6 zo2) [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Nicole: 食咗 (sik6 zo2) [natural native speed] |
| Nicole: 做咗 (zou6 zo2) [natural native speed] |
| David: to have worked |
| Nicole: 做咗 (zou6 zo2) [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Nicole: 做咗 (zou6 zo2) [natural native speed] |
| Nicole: 講咗 (gong2 zo2) [natural native speed] |
| David: spoke, to have spoken |
| Nicole: 講咗 (gong2 zo2) [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Nicole: 講咗 (gong2 zo2) [natural native speed] |
| Nicole: 飲咗 (jam2 zo2) [natural native speed] |
| David: to have drank |
| Nicole: 飲咗 (jam2 zo2) [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Nicole: 飲咗 (jam2 zo2) [natural native speed] |
| VOCAB AND PHRASE USAGE |
| David: Let's have a closer look at the usage for some of these words and phrases from this lesson. |
| Nicole: The first phrase is 幾時 (gei2 si4). |
| David: “When” |
| Nicole: 幾時 (gei2 si4). |
| David: “When” |
| Nicole: 幾時 (gei2 si4). |
| David: And we use this in questions, like |
| Nicole: 幾時放假? (gei2 si4 fong3 gaa3?) |
| David: “When is the holiday?” |
| Nicole: 幾時放假？(gei2 si4 fong3 gaa3?) |
| David: When is the holiday. It’s a simple question, first we have “when” 幾時 (gei2 si4), and then we’ve got a verb 放假 (fong3 gaa3). Let’s replace this with an easier phrase, like, "to go to class". Which gives us a sentence “When is class?” |
| Nicole: 幾時上課 (gei2 si4 soeng5 fo3). |
| David: “When is class?“ |
| Nicole: 幾時上課 (gei2 si4 soeng5 fo3). |
| David: Right. And the answer to that might be "just now". |
| Nicole: 頭先 (tau4 sin1). |
| David: “just now”. |
| Nicole: 頭先 (tau4 sin1). |
| David: “just now”. |
| Nicole: 我頭先去咗上課 (ngo5 tau4 sin1 heoi3 zo2 soeng5 fo3). |
| David: “I just went to class.” |
| Nicole: 我頭先去咗上課 (ngo5 tau4 sin1 heoi3 zo2 soeng5 fo3). |
| David: “I just went to class.” |
| Nicole: Right. Another example is 佢哋頭先走咗 (keoi5 dei6 tau4 sin1 zau2 zo2). |
| David: “They just left.” |
| Nicole: 佢哋頭先走咗 (keoi5 dei6 tau4 sin1 zau2 zo2). |
| David: That’s literally “they left, just now.” |
| Nicole: We also have a lot of verbs in this lesson. |
| David: Right. These are things everyone does. |
| Nicole: So we have to learn them. |
| David: The first is... |
| Nicole: 做 (zou6) |
| David: “to do” |
| Nicole: 做 (zou6) |
| David: “to do” |
| Nicole: although we hear this in the past tense 做咗 (zou6 zo2). |
| David: our second verb is |
| Nicole: 講 (gong2) |
| David: “to talk” |
| Nicole: 講 (gong2) |
| David: “to talk” |
| Nicole: although we hear this in the past tense 講咗 (gong2 zo2) |
| David: Our third verb is |
| Nicole: 飲 (jam2) |
| David: “to drink” |
| Nicole: 飲 (jam2) |
| David: “to drink” |
| Nicole: although we hear this in the past tense 飲咗 (jam2 zo2) |
| David: Right. |
| Nicole: Like in the sentence 佢飲咗我杯酒 (keoi5 jam2 zo2 ngo5 bui1 zau2). |
| David: “He drank my glass of wine.” |
| Nicole: 佢飲咗我杯酒 (keoi5 jam2 zo2 ngo5 bui1 zau2). |
| David: Right. And the past tense is actually the subject of our grammar point today. |
| Nicole: Right. So let’s get to it. |
Lesson focus |
|---|
| David: As we promised, we’re going to talk about past tense. |
| Nicole: The past tense marker 咗 (zo2). |
| David: The good news is, past tense in Cantonese is really easy, we add that 咗 (zo2) at the end of our verb, it’s super easy. |
| Nicole: Verb + 咗 (zo2) / Verb + 咗 (zo2)... |
| David: Let's hear some examples. |
| Nicole: 做 (zo6) |
| David: “to do” |
| Nicole: And the past tense is 做咗 (zou6 zo2) |
| David: “to have done” |
| Nicole: 講 (gong2) |
| David: “to speak” |
| Nicole: And the past tense is 講咗 (gong2 zo2) |
| David: “to have spoke” |
| Nicole: 飲 (jam2) |
| David: “to drink” |
| Nicole: And the past tense is 飲咗 (jam2 zo2) |
| David: “to have drunk” |
| David: As in “He drank my glass of wine.” |
| Nicole: 佢飲咗我杯酒 (keoi5 jam2 zo2 ngo5 bui1 zau2). |
| David: See how easy Cantonese is. |
| Nicole: That’s right! There's no conjugation, no adding extra verbs like "have" in front of these. |
| David: Yeah, it’s much much easier than English. Anyways, it’s really easy. You just add 咗 (zo2) to the end of your verbs. Let's hear some sample sentences to really drive this stuff home. |
| Nicole: The first sentence is 我隻狗死咗 (ngo5 zek3 gau2 sei2 zo2). |
| David: “My dog died.” |
| Nicole: 我隻狗死咗 (ngo5 zek3 gau2 sei2 zo2). |
| David: “My dog died.” |
| Nicole: 佢哋頭先走咗 (keoi5 dei6 tau4 sin1 zau2 zo2). |
| David: “They just left.” |
| Nicole: 佢哋頭先走咗 (keoi5 dei6 tau4 sin1 zau2 zo2). |
| David: “They just left.” |
| Nicole: 我食咗飯 (ngo5 sik6 zo2 faan6). |
| David: Finally... a happy one. That's "I ate dinner". |
| Nicole: 我食咗飯 (ngo5 sik6 zo2 faan6). |
| David: "I ate dinner". So, a useful point we can make here, we have the verb and the object, we split them apart to put 咗 (zo2) right after the verb. So “to have eaten dinner” is… |
| Nicole: 食咗飯 (sik6 zo2 faan6). |
Outro |
| David: Perfect! So that does it for today. |
| Nicole: Thank you for listening. |
| David: And we’ll see you on the site. |
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