“I've never eaten Japanese food.” in Filipino

When to use it

Use it when someone offers you a dish and you want to say you have never tried that kind of food.

The sentence in English (“I've never eaten Japanese food.”)

In “I've never eaten Japanese food.” ‘I've’ is ‘I have’ plus the participle ‘eaten’, and ‘never’ is already negative.

I

pronounpersonal pronoun, always written with a capital letter

've

auxiliary verbhave · tense: present · person: first · number: singular · short form of "have"; with "eaten" it talks about life experience up to now

never

adverbadverb of frequency

eaten

verbeat · form: past participle · irregular verb: eat, ate, eaten

Japanese

adjectiveadjective of nationality, always capitalised in English

food

nounnoun

The sentence in Filipino (“Hindi pa ako nakakakain ng pagkaing Hapon.”)

In “Hindi pa ako nakakakain ng pagkaing Hapon.” ‘Hindi pa’ (not yet) gives ‘never so far’. ‘nakakakain’ is ‘kain’ (eat) with ‘naka-’ and a repeated syllable, expressing experience. ‘pagkaing Hapon’ is ‘pagkain’ (food) joined by the linker ‘-ng’ to ‘Hapon’ (Japan).

Hindi

adverbnegation 'not'

pa

particle'yet'; hindi pa = 'not yet'

ako

pronounpronoun 'I'

nakakakain

verbkain · form: naka- (ability/experience) · aspect: imperfective · naka- + reduplication + kain: experience of having eaten

ng

prepositionmarker ng before the object

pagkaing

nounpagkain 'food' + linker -ng

Hapon

proper nounproper noun 'Japan'

What changes from one language to the other (English × Filipino)

English uses one word, ‘never’; Filipino ‘Hindi pa’. English puts the adjective first, ‘Japanese food’; Filipino puts the noun first and links ‘Hapon’ with ‘-ng’.

Example conversation