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Speaker 1: Here's a fun fact in twenty ten. I started Happy

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English in twoenty ten. That sounds pretty accurate, right, And

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saying the date or the year is certainly correct. But

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that's not always how native speakers talk in everyday conversation.

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We're often much more casual and even imprecise when we

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talk about the past. And that's what I want to

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introduce to you today, some very informal ways native speakers

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talk about the past casually in English.

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Speaker 2: Welcome to another Happy English podcast, coming to you from

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New York City, and here's your English teacher, Michael.

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Speaker 1: All right, thank you, John, and thanks everyone. It's Michael

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here from Happy English and I help people speak English better.

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And this is Happy English Podcast, Episode nine seventy eight.

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Casually talking about the past in English. If you want

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to sound more informal and natural when you talk about

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the past, you're in the right place. We're going to

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look at six commonly used casual phrases that you can

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use to talk about the past, starting with back then.

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We use the phrase back then when we're comparing the

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past to the present, like if you're talking about technology

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with a friend and how different things are now. You

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can say things like back then, the only thing we

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could do with a phone was make a call. Or

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if you're comparing the weather nowadays to the past, you

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might say something like, back then, we had a lot

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more snow in the winter. Her back then doesn't mean

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a specific date or year. Back then just means that

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period in the past, based on the context of the conversation.

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In casual conversation, it's not always necessary to speak so

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precisely about time, as long as the context is understood.

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A similar phrase is back in the day. Back in

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the day has the nuance of when I was young,

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and so it often sounds more nostalgic or emotional, like

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I remember back in the day when I wanted to

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listen to new music, I used to go to the

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music store to buy record albums. By the way, if

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you don't know what a music store or a record

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album is, haha, welcome to my generation gap. And you

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know what, back in the day, once we got the

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record home, we would spend hours looking at the artwork

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and reading all of the lyrics and the liner notes. Yeah,

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records came with a lot of reading material back in

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the day. You'll often hear back in the day when

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people are remembering the good old days, or when they're

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comparing how things used to be with how things are now.

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Here too, Back in the day doesn't mean one exact time.

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It just means some particular earlier period in my life. Now,

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let's look at the phrase at the time. We use

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at the time when we're talking about how things felt

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or what you thought during a past situation. Like I

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started this podcast in twenty fourteen. At the time, I

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had no idea that I'd be doing this for over

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ten years. Wow. Time flies. I just had a blog

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to teach English at the time, so I thought putting

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my voice out there might be a good way to

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help people learn English. And that's interesting because at the

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time podcasts were just voice and now they've become videos too.

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We often use at the time when looking back and reflecting,

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especially when our opinion or the situation has changed. The

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next one is a long time ago. A long time

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ago is very flexible and common when talking about something

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that happened in the past, and it feels like way

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in the past, Like I learned how to drive a

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long time ago, or I started playing the guitar a

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long time ago. It could be five years ago, twenty

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years ago. The exact time doesn't matter in casual conversation,

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It's not always important to be precise about time, and

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that brings us to the next part of this English lesson.

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Let's move on to more casual and slightly exaggerated expressions.

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English speakers, and in particular in American English, we love

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to use exaggeration. It makes stories more fun and natural,

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like when the train is very crowded, someone might say, oh, man,

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there were a million people on the train this morning,

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or when talking about a hot day, oh my gosh,

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it's a thousand degrees outside. This kind of colorful exaggeration

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also makes its way into conversations about time, like the

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phrase ages ago. Technically, an age means a particular time

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period in history, like the Ice Age or the age

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of dinosaurs. In casual conversation, the phrase ages ago means

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a long time ago, but it sounds casual and friendly,

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like my friend David I met him ages ago back

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when we worked together at a language school in Japan.

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By the way, if you studied English at geos in

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Sendai ages ago and remember me and David from then,

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let me know ages ago. It's not literally a historical period.

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It just feels like it was sometime in the past,

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far away from now. The last phrase for today is

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a million years ago. If you hear someone say that

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something happened a million years ago, and that person is

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not talking about dinosaurs, it's a casual and fun way

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to mean this happened such a long time ago that

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it feels like a million years ago. This is pure exaggeration,

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and we use it for what I call comical emphasis.

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Like the other day, one of my friends asked me

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about the original Star Wars movie and I was like, wow,

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I saw that movie a million years ago. Or I

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asked one of my students when she started studying English

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and she said, oh my, that was like a million

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years ago. No one thinks you really mean a million

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years It just means so long ago that it feels

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distant now. And yes, Americans use this kind of exaggeration

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all the time in casual conversation. So there you have it.

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Sometimes you need to precisely say when something happened. I

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started teaching English in nineteen ninety four, But in everyday

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casual conversation it's perfectly fine to talk about the past

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using the phrases from this lesson, especially when something happened

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in the past and it feels like that was a

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million years ago. Storytelling and reminiscing about the past can

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happen in a colorful, casual way like this, And keep

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in mind the best way to remember English like this

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and any other word or phrase in English, is to

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take that word or phrase, write it in a sentence

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that's true for you or true in your world, and

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then memorize your sentences. Hey, thanks for listening, and remember

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learning another language is not easy, but it's not impossible,

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and I'm here to help you on your journey.

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Speaker 2: This podcast was brought to you by Happy English. Please

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visit Myhappy English dot com show your support for Happy

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English by leaving us a review. Get English, Get Happy,

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Happy English.