“It’s getting cold fast.” I thought as I walked into the now becoming unpleasant early morning chill. The bright halfmoon hung high in the sky, and next to it stars twinkled and sparkled. It felt a treat! It felt I was given a present! As it’s so rare to see stars here in New York. I looked and admired: there were quite a few of them even!

“Oh. It’s so dark. Day comes later now.” The cold stung my bare arms as I jogged on. “It’s only downhill from now on. New York winter could be harsh.” But who said that?

First it’s the shock. I lay flat on the ground, paused, in astonishment. Later on I thought that must be what children feel when they fall: there is always at first the look of bewilderment. What has just happened? they must be thinking, before the pain comes and they proceed to cry.

“You tripped? Over a jutted out tree root on the ground? You could not see? Oh. It’s always the darkest before dawn you know.” On hearing my story, one friend threw out this saying carelessly, and in this case, the line took on its literal meaning.

Chinese language takes wonderfully little fuss about the tenses and forms. A verb, take “eat” for example, is one character: 吃. It matters not, as it in English, what subject comes before the verb (I, we, he, she, it, they), the verb stays the same. As a character is a definite and finished form, 吃, means “eat”. The character has a “口”, a mouth, in it, anything that with a mouth that could put food in it is able to conduct the action of eating. And 吃 is used indiscriminately: 我吃。我们吃。他吃。他们吃。

And, now a thought comes to my mind: that unlike English or perhaps German, Chinese does not have very clear and clarified grammer on tenses. As the English or German demands precision, and they have their languages to correspond to this need of being precise. Chinese, it’s known to the world, is at once philosophical and practical.

And, I meant to say, Chinese, for thousands of years it has been existing and evolving, despite its absolute simplicity on grammatical tense ( normally instead of easing Chinese language learners, often confusing them for the lack of definite rules), serves to meet every demand for expressing every situation a human could meet in life.

I fell. That for the Chinese is an action done and completed.

我跌倒了。

Here it uses the particle 了 after the verb to indicate the action is done and complete. It often, yet not always, means it’s in the past. For 了 could also indicate changes: here indeed it also is a change–from running, standing upright to falling, laying flat on the ground. But it could also indicate changes and the action is not yet past but still in continuous: like a note of the change of weather: 秋天来了: Fall is coming. 天冷了: Sky(weather) (is getting) cold. (It’s getting cold.) 下雨了: down rain (change indication: it was not raining before but now it’s raining), in proper English it would be: it’s raining.

Since 了 focus not on the past but the completion of an action, it also can be used to talk about the future: 吃了饭我就去。I will go as soon as I finish eating the meal.

And it could express your annoyance of something you hope it has done and is over but it’s not: 别吵了！Have done with quarreling!

That’s why if the student were told 了 is a particle for the past tense, he could get confused: for the focus is not on the past but the completion of an action or the changes, changing of a situation.

And it could be used directly after adjectives too: 好了！It’s good now! Finished! Done! 冷了！It’s getting cold!

So so as there is ambiguity in the world and in life itself: who can divide night and day as a knife divides a watermelon? There is ambiguity in Chinese language, for the Chinese never seperate himself from the bigger world, from nature.