Help with JAPANESE.

[shu]

Hello there,I am learning japanese,and when you are using a sentence what are the tenses for words like iku(go) when you use masu it changes to ikimasu.does it change to something else when you use mashita or masen?

 

[Jazmine Marie]

Ikimashita means 'went'. Mashita is past tense, positive. So, watashi wa, gakkou ni ikimashita means 'I went to school'.

Ikimasen means 'not going'. Masen is present tense, negative. So, watashi wa, gakkou ni ikimasen means 'I'm not going to school'.

Another ending is masen deshita, which is past tense, negative. So, watashi wa, yuubinkyoku ni ikimasen deshita means 'I didn't go to the post office'.

Tenses can be difficult when first learning Japanese. Asking your teacher for extra help is often times a very beneficial idea.

 

[shu]

What about the bases for words?

 

[Jazmine Marie]

By bases, do you mean verb conjugations?

 

[Esper]

All verbs end in u, tsu, ru, mu, bu, nu, ku, or gu.

With the exception of some special verbs (kuru, suru and certain ru verbs like taberu) when you're using the -masu forms they all change by dropping the 'u' sound and adding an 'i' sound. So you get:

i, chi, ri, mi, bi, ni, ki, or gi.

For example: kau (to buy)

kau -> kaimasu (present/future tense), kaimasen (negative present/future tense) kaimashita (past tense), kaimasen deshita (negative past tense)

there's also kaimashou (let's "---") which can sometimes work as a future tense, but that's a bit advanced.

 

[shu]

yes, thanks for answering my questions.