Page 2 - 过 and 了
P. 2
Subject+ 没 +verb+ 过 object
As is often the case in Chinese grammar, the object is optional and the subject
is even more optional.
w ǒ méi kàn guò
我 没 看 过。I haven’t seen it.
t ā méi q ù guò měiguó
他 没 去 过 美国。He hasn’t been to America.
过 with 从来没有 (cónglái méiyǒu) Because 过 is used to talk about things that
have been experienced in done in the past, you can combine it with 从来没有 to
say that something has never happened. The structure for this is:
subject +从来没有+ verb+ 过+ object
w ǒ cónglái méiyǒu zhè m e shēngq ì guò
我 从来 没有 这么 生 气 过。
I’ve never been angry like this before.
t ā cónglái méiyǒu jiànguò r ú c ǐ d à d e gǒu
他 从来 没有 见过 如此 大的 狗。
He’d never seen such a big dog before.
Saying the full 从来没有 is quite emphatic. You can often reduce it to 从来没 if
you don’t want such a long sentence.
Asking questions with 过
n ǐ yǒuméiyǒu q ùguò zhōngguó
你 有没有 去过 中 国？Have you ever been to China?
n ǐ tīngshuō guò b a
你 听 说 过 吧？ You’ve heard about it, right?
As you can see, 过 can combine with all the usual ways of forming questions in
Chinese grammar.
The difference between 过 and 了 The two particles 过 and 了 (le) might seem
quite similar: both can be used to talk about completed actions. The differences
are:
• 了 indicates that the event took place, e.g.
