Speaker 1: I saw a buddy of mine from high school the
other day. It was really nice to catch up with him.
He said he's planning on selling his house. He said
he wants to buy a sailboat. And then he said
he's gonna sail from California to Indonesia. I said, that's crazy.
Speaker 2: Welcome to another Happy English podcast, coming to you from
New York City. And here's your English teacher, Michael.
Speaker 1: All right, thank you John, and thanks everyone. It's Michael
here from Happy English and I help people speak English better.
And this is Happy English Podcast, Episode seven eighty six.
How we really use say say is connected to the
words we use, Like when you are not sure of
someone's words, you can ask them what did you say?
What did you say? We also use say to tell
someone what's written, Like if you go to a cafe
and there's a notice on the door, you can give
that information using say, oh, it says that the shop
is closed this week for vacation. Interesting, isn't it. Even
though you're reporting what's written, you can use say it
says that the shop is closed this week for vacation.
We also use say when we tell someone the words
another person used. You probably heard that this is called
reported speech. Like imagine you see your friend David and
the converse goes something like this, Hey dude, what's up. Oh,
check it out. I finally quit my job. I'm gonna
start my own business. So that was the information you
got from David. When you tell another person what David said,
you can use say like I saw David yesterday. He
said he quit his job and he's gonna start his
own business. Notice the verb tenses there. I used both
the past and the future. He said he quit his job.
I use said here because my conversation with David was
in the past. He said he quit his job. I
use quit because he left his job before we spoke.
He said he's gonna start his own business. I use
gonna here because the information from David is about what
he is gonna do. Conversationally, when we use say or
said to refer to someone's words, we tend to use
whatever verb tense is true in real life. Let's look
at another example. Conversation, Hey, Jenny, what are you doing here? Oh?
I work in this building. Now, it's really nice. Jenny
said she works in this building. Now. Jenny said she works.
It's true in real life David said he quit his job.
He said he's gonna start his own business. All true
in real life. Now, you probably learned in school that
when you do you say for reported speech, the verbs
need to go in the past tense, like Jenny said
she worked in this building. David said he was gonna
start his own business. Keeping all the verbs in the
past is generally done in written English, but in conversational English,
we like to keep things real otherwise facts can be confusing.
Imagine you see a friend Paul, and you have this conversation, Hey, Paul,
what's up. Still living in Jersey notnmore? I live in Brooklyn. Now,
then today you see another friend, how would you tell
them about Paul. Hey, I saw Paul today. He said
he live lived in Brooklyn. Listen to that again, he
said he lived in Brooklyn. He said he lived. That
makes me feel like he used to live in Brooklyn.
And you would probably write that in a letter. But
let's be honest, who writes letters these days? The best
way to tell your friend about Paul is using grammar
that's true in real life. Like, hey, I saw Paul today,
he said he lives in Brooklyn. That's true. Okay, let's review.
David said he quit his job. That was yesterday. David
said he's going to start his own business. This is
gonna happen soon. Jenny said she works in this building. Now,
this is true. Now. Paul said he he lives in Brooklyn.
This is also true. Now. When you use say to
conversationally mention another person's words, remember to keep the verb
in whatever tense is true in real life. And keep
in mind the best way to remember English like this
and any other word or phrase in English, is to
take that word or phrase, write it in a sentence
that's true for you or true in your world, and
then memorize your sentences. Hey, did you know you can
get more practice using your English when you join my
podcast Learner's study group. There you can make new friends,
join us for live group lessons every week where we
practice these podcast lessons together. Plus you get access to
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in the past and in the future. And on top
of that, each episode has exercises where you can practice
this English point with speaking and writing checked by me.
To learn more, just visit Myhappy English dot com and
choose podcast lesson seven eighty six remember learning another language
is not easy, but it's not impossible, and I'm here
to help you on your journey.
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