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Olive file 673 Posted 8 years ago
Grammar

Past simple or past perfect progressive

This is an example from a book: "I had been teaching English in Japan when the earthquake hit." To me this means that I had been teaching for a while at the time the earthquake hit. If I just want to express that at the time of the earthquake I was employed as a teacher in Japan, regardless of how long I had been working there can I say "I taught English in Japan when the earthquake hit"?

  

Top answer

" To me, this example seems slightly odd. olive file 673 If I just want to express that at the time of the earthquake I was employed as a teacher in Japan, regardless of how long I had been working there can I say "I taught English in Japan when the earthquake hit"? No.

  • " To me, this example seems slightly odd.
  • olive file 673 If I just want to express that at the time of the earthquake I was employed as a teacher in Japan, regardless of how long I had been working there can I say "I taught English in Japan when the earthquake hit"?
  • No.
  • You can say "At the time (that) the earthquake hit, I was teaching English in Japan".
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1 Answers
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olive file 673This is an example from a book: "I had been teaching English in Japan when the earthquake hit."

To me, this example seems slightly odd.

olive file 673If I just want to express that at the time of the earthquake I was employed as a teacher in Japan, regardless of how long I had been working there can I say "I taught

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