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The Weather

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Tha gu bha

Tha-bha

Joy explains the simple past tense and its positive and negative forms.

What happens if you want to talk about the weather a few days ago in the past? You might have had incredible weather over the past few days, or you might be struggling to keep a conversation going. We’ll learn the simple past tense just now. You already know the structures. 

Cò ris a bha an aimsir coltach an-dè?

What was the weather like yesterday?

Cò ris a bha an t-sìde coltach Diciadain?

What was the weather like on Wednesday?

Only one word has changed: tha to bha. Tha is the present tense of ‘to be’ (‘am, are, is’) and bha is the past tense (‘was, were’).

Bha i fliuch

It was wet

Bha i teth

It was hot

To say the weather wasn’t something we need a negative form of the verb. In the present tense we used Chan eil, but in the past tense we say Cha robh.

Tha -> Bha 

Chan eil -> Cha robh 

Bha

(It) was

Cha robh

(It) was not

To ask a Yes/No question in the present tense we used A bheil…?  In the past tense, we ask An robh…?  The answer Yes is Bha and the answer No is Cha robh .

We also learnt the negative question Nach eil…? In the past tense, the negative question is Nach robh…?  

A bheil …? -> An robh …? 

Nach eil …? -> Nach robh …? 

An robh …?

Was …?

Nach robh …?

Wasn’t …?

This gives us a whole new structure we can add to the ones we have learnt already.