Unit 20 - Remembering your Schooldays
Bha mi modhail "I was polite"
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This unit concerns a topic which we all have in common – our education as children, about which we are wont to reminisce. It will require the use of the past tense of various verbs. Most commonly, at least with regular verbs, the past tense is constructed by leniting the root of the verb. This is best explained by some examples:
| root of verb | meaning | past tense | example | translation of example |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| cuir | put | chuir | chuir mi uisge anns a’ phoit | I put water in a pot |
| tog | lift | thog | thog mi a’ chlach | I lifted the rock |
| dùin | close | dhùin | dhùin mi an doras | I closed the door |
| tachair | happen | thachair | thachair rud annasach | a strange thing happened |
When we want to make a negative form of the past tense we put cha do in front of it. The interrogative (question) forms are an do and nach do. Look at the examples below and listen to them:
- cha do chuir mi uisge anns a’ phoit
- I didn’t put water in the pot
- an do chuir thu uisge anns a’ phoit?
- did you put water in the pot?
- nach do chuir thu uisge anns a’ phoit?
- didn’t you put water in the pot?
- an do dhùin thu an doras?
- did you close the door?
- cha do dhùin sinn an doras
- we didn’t close the door
- nach do dhùin iad an doras?
- didn’t they close the door?
In the conversation that follows you will see the past tense of some regular verbs, and the past tense of the verb “to be” ie bha, cha robh, an robh and nach robh which are the past equivalents of tha, chan eil, a bheil and nach eil. Note also the useful phrase an do chòrd X riut? (“did you enjoy X?”), which employs the preposition ri, and to which the answer is chòrd (“yes”) or cha do chòrd (“no”).
