VerbTenses

From Ial

No need to indicate tense all the time. As in Chinese, tense is usually indicated only when it cannot be determined from context. This rule makes our language easier for Chinese. Yet speakers of other languages like English have no difficulty at all in learning to use verbs without marking them for tense. Chinese express time reference through adverbials, time phrases like "now", "before now","after now", "yesterday", "tomorrow" and so on.