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Thread: was/were

  1. #1
    Rock Girl's Avatar
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    Default was/were

    Hi,

    Which of the statement do you consider correct?

    - It was blessing if you would be here.
    - It were blessing if you would be here.

    Should I use "were" or "was"?

    thanks,
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  2. #2
    flowersa is offline Junior Member
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    Default Re: was/were

    Hi Girl, for It you always use "Was" no matter what, for "They" you'll always use "Were"
    so that's one correct - It was blessing if you would be here.

    I think that before the blessing you should add an (a) but I'm not sure, anyway
    I hope it's clear now
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    Default Re: was/were

    Quote Originally Posted by flowersa View Post
    Hi Girl, for It you always use "Was" no matter what, for "They" you'll always use "Were"
    so that's one correct - It was blessing if you would be here.

    I think that before the blessing you should add an (a) but I'm not sure, anyway
    I hope it's clear now

    thanks for your answer.

    I know I should use simple form of verb for "It". but since the statements are a type of conditional sentences, I wasn't sure about their functions. Because I remember once I used "If I were a bird, I could fly!"
    I just wanted to know if it's correct for my example.

    thanks anyway,
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    flowersa is offline Junior Member
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    Default Re: was/were

    Hi Girl, It's not familiar for me to see "If I were a bird" did you see it in any context?
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    Rock Girl's Avatar
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    Default Re: was/were

    Quote Originally Posted by flowersa View Post
    Hi Girl, It's not familiar for me to see "If I were a bird" did you see it in any context?
    I once used it, but I'm not sure if it's grammatically correct. I'm confused!!!
    I guess it's conditional type 2.
    e.g: If I knew it, I might tell her.
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    Default Re: was/were

    Quote Originally Posted by flowersa View Post
    Hi Girl, It's not familiar for me to see "If I were a bird" did you see it in any context?
    Hello flowersa. If you are going to start answering students' questions here, you should make it very clear that you aren't a teacher. It's in your profile that you're not a native speaker so that's OK. But it was only this morning that Bhai and I answered some rather basic questions about English phrases for you when you showed up with "Hi guys I'm new here and want to understand English as the natives so I'll have a lot of questions to ask here ..."

    I'm only asking whether you should reconsider answering such posts with authoritative pronouncements such as "Hi Girl, for It you always use "Was" no matter what, for "They" you'll always use "Were"
    If it were true what you say, there would not be a problem. But as you can see from my last sentence, what you've written is not true, and as you can see from Rock Girl's last post, you have her well and truly confused, because she probably assumes you know what you're talking about.

    (And why TheParser has gone through "liking" all these posts without realising that there was a major problem of communication to be fixed, I really can't fathom).
    Last edited by Raymott; 19-Jan-2012 at 10:59.

  7. #7
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    Default Re: was/were

    Quote Originally Posted by Rock Girl View Post
    Hi,

    Which of the statement do you consider correct?

    - It was a blessing if you would be here.
    - It were a blessing if you would be here.

    Should I use "were" or "was"?
    Neither is correct.
    thanks,
    I would say, "It would be a blessing if you were here"; "It would be a blessing if you could be here".
    You shouldn't start this sentence with either "It was ..." or "It were ..."
    Last edited by Raymott; 19-Jan-2012 at 11:21.
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    Default Re: was/were

    Quote Originally Posted by flowersa View Post
    Hi Girl, It's not familiar for me to see "If I were a bird" did you see it in any context?
    I was told at my university that "If I were" and "If I was" are both correct, but the latter is less formal. Is that true?
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  9. #9
    flowersa is offline Junior Member
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    Default Re: was/were

    Quote Originally Posted by Raymott View Post
    Hello flowersa. If you are going to start answering students' questions here, you should make it very clear that you aren't a teacher. It's in your profile that you're not a native speaker so that's OK. But it was only this morning that Bhai and I answered some rather basic questions about English phrases for you when you showed up with "Hi guys I'm new here and want to understand English as the natives so I'll have a lot of questions to ask here ..."

    I'm only asking whether you should reconsider answering such posts with authoritative pronouncements such as "Hi Girl, for It you always use "Was" no matter what, for "They" you'll always use "Were"
    If it were true what you say, there would not be a problem. But as you can see from my last sentence, what you've written is not true, and as you can see from Rock Girl's last post, you have her well and truly confused, because she probably assumes you know what you're talking about.

    (And why TheParser has gone through "liking" all these posts without realising that there was a major problem of communication to be fixed, I really can't fathom).
    Sorry Sorry ... I forgot I'm on "A teacher" place ... I'm not in any mean a teacher that should be clear ...

  10. #10
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    Default Re: was/were

    Quote Originally Posted by Rock Girl View Post
    Hi,

    Which of the statement do you consider correct?

    - It was blessing if you would be here.
    - It were blessing if you would be here.

    Should I use "were" or "was"?

    thanks,
    Before saying anything else, please disregard both of "flowers"'s posts. Both contain incorrect and misleading information.

    As far as your original question is concerned, I think you are looking for:

    It would be a blessing if you were here.
    It would be a blessing if you could be here.
    It would have been blessing if you could have been here.
    It would have been a blessing if you had been here.
    It would have been a blessing had you been here.

    I don't know if you were referring to the past or the future so it's difficult to know which one you need.
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