There is a future tense in German, but people don’t use it very often. In fact, after studying German for about five months, I had to ask my teacher if we could learn the future tense. “Sure, if you want,” she replied, “but it takes five minutes and we really don’t use it.” Instead of the future, Germans say most things in present tense. If you want to say, for example, “I will be going to New York on Monday,” you just say, “I go to New York on Monday.” Instead of, “I will make dinner tonight,” you say, “I make dinner tonight.”
I discovered earlier this week that this can cause a problem of miscommunication. My co-worker asked me to update a document, and I replied, “Ich mache das jetzt,” which means, “I do it now”–but my intended meaning was that I was about to do it. In English, I would have said, “I will do it now.” Five minutes later, she came back to my office and asked me again, whether I was doing it. This time, I actually was in the process of updating it, and wanted to say, “I am doing it now,” but my answer in German was exactly the same: “Ich mache das jetzt.” I bet the Germans have a way to distinguish these situations, perhaps just by adding other words to supply context, but I just missed the future.
21 December 2008 at 5:39 pm
In Dutch, which I suspect might have a similar grammar to German, “I do it now” would mean “I’m doing it now.” This is because the word “now” is often used in the stead of the present continuous tense, which is mostly absent in Dutch.
In contrast, “I do it soon” would be a clearer indication of future action.