Re: Verbs with -teiru

Bart Mathias wrote:
Tremal-Naik wrote:
Hi to all and sorry for my english... I'm reading a japanese grammar and I've got a doubt with verbs and the -teiru form.

I understand that a phrase like:

inu wa uchi ni agatteimasu

means "The dog is entered in the house" (there is a state-change in the subject), not "The dog is entering in the house".

My doubt is this: a phrase like

ima, inu wa uchi ni agarimasu

is a correct grammar construction to say "The dog is entering in the house" (in this moment) or there is a more elegant construction?

With verbs like "agaru" and "shinu," either it has happened already, or is yet to happen. No dog is partly entered and partly outside (from the language point of view--granted you could take a picture of a dog with head in and tail out, but if the dog is really going in, the event would be over before you get the sentence out; if he stops midway, you'd use a different sentence).

Similarly, anyone who is not dead is alive.

Bart

Hmm. One of my kids, when she was about four or five, was trying to refer to the time before she was born. She said, "When I was dead..." I thought there was something deeply philosophical about that, but I couldn't quite put my finger on it.
.

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