Contrary to English, Chinese has no verb conjugation, which doesn’t imply that they can not express issues that occurred in the past or future. 

To express the past they use some time word like "yesterday" ("昨天"zuótiān)or adding "过"(guò) at the end of the sentence to indicate over, past or by adding 了le at the end of the verb or the sentence.

The word order for a basic declarative sentence in Standard Chinese is subject–verb–object (SVO), much like English.        

For example, the sentence "我洗衣服" (wǒ xǐ yī fú, "I wash the clothes.")

The present

Chinese verbs do not to conjugate like the verbs of most Indo-European languages as English or Spanish. In English, for instance, the verb "to eat" has a lot of forms when compared to its Chinese equivalent: "to eat" (infinitive), "eat, eats" (present), "ate", (simple past), "eaten" (past participle), "eating" (present participle), etc. Chinese only has a single fundamental type, utilized for every particular person and tense.

The past

The easiest strategy of expressing past tense would be to use adverbs such as "yesterday." "the day before yesterday" For instance: 昨天我洗衣服了(zuótiān wǒ xǐ yīfú le, " Yesterday I wash the clothes.") is equal to saying "Yesterday I washed clothes". Another means of expressing previous tense is usually to use "guò" (过) or "le" (了)，which can't stand by themselves but can express finished actions when positioned after verbs. The distinction between these and other particles can be tough for learners to grasp. Past tense in Chinese can also be emphasized by surrounding the verb and direct object using the phrases "shì"-"de" (是-的). Here the time is ample to express the previous tense but the " shi...de " pattern emphasizes for purpose. For example"昨天我是洗衣服的" (zuótiān wǒ shì xǐ yīfú de, " Yesterday I washed the clothes.") This phrasing emphasizes the time in which the action took place more than the action itself.

Negation of Chinese verbs

Negation of Chinese verbs is completed by inserting bù (不),which can be interpreted approximately as "not", ahead of the verb to be negated. For instance: "wǒ bù chī jī" (我不吃鸡, literally: I not eat chicken) is equal to saying "I don't eat chicken". Serial verbs and verbal complements complicate matters.

There exists one particular exception to this rule, nevertheless. The verb "yǒu" (有to have) is negated with the particle "méi" (没). The past negative is made by use of "méi yǒu" 没有instead of "bù" 不. For example: "wǒ méi yǒu jī" (我没有鸡) "I do not have chicken".

Questions

While some languages like English invert the verb and subject, Chinese makes use of two various constructions.

The particle "ma" (written)

This particle "ma" (吗) is placed on the quite end of the simple affirmative sentence to turn it into a Yes/No question. For example:

"wǒ chī jī" (我吃鸡): "I eat chicken"

"wǒ chī jī ma?" (我吃鸡吗?): "Do I eat chicken?"

The "verb-not-verb" construction

A question could also be formed by stating the affirmative and the damaging consecutively; that's, taking the verb, placing "bù" (不) after it and then repeating the verb once more:

"nǐ qù" (你去) "You are going."

"nǐ qù bú qù" (你去不去?)(literally: you go not go?) "Are you going?"