The good news is there is that there are no verb tenses to memorize in Mandarin. Basically each verb just has one character and one way of saying it. So to express time we must insert a time word before the verb.


The basic sentence sturcture is:  Subject + Character for when the event takes place + Verb. In thes video we use the example of going to Shanghai and learn to say “Today I go to Shanghai”, “Yesterday I went to Shanghai” and “Tomorrow I will go to Shanghai”.

Mandarin Chinese Present Tense
我今天去上海 = wǒ jīn tiān qù shàng hǎi
I (wǒ) today (jīn tiān ) go (qù) Shanghai

Mandarin Chinese Future Tense
我明天去上海 = wǒ míng tiān qù shàng hǎi

I (wǒ) tomorrow (míng tiān ) go (qù) Shanghai

Mandarin Chinese Past tense
我昨天去上海 = wǒ zuó tiān qù shàng hǎi
I (wǒ) yesterday (zuó tiān ) go (qù) Shanghai