This is a lesson about past continuous in Farsi, or you can say past progressive.
So we we learned how to form a past simple. So to form a past simple,
we had the infinitive. For example "رفتن" and then dropping "ن" and
adding the personal endings, "رفتم",
means "I went". Now you want to say that "I was going, " an action that was
continuous in the past and now it's not in continuation. It was
repeated in a certain period of time in the past. So in order to form that, we
have the past simple. You need just to add "می" before the past simple. So you
have "رفتم" and "می رفتم". I was going. For example,
من به مدرسه می رفتم.
I was going to school. Contextually, sometimes it can be
translated to "I used to go to school," a continuous action in the past which is
not being done now. So something that was repeatedlhappening in the past
but not in the present time. So:
من به مدرسه می رفتم.
I was going to
school. It means that now I'm not going, but I was going. Another example! For
example, "خوردن".
To form a past continuous, first we make the past simple "خوردم", then adding
the "می" in the beginning "می خوردم". I was eating.
دیروز در رستوران غذا می خوردم.
I was eating yesterday in
the restaurant. I was eating food .So in English, yesterday I was eating food in
the restaurant. But it's an action continuous for a while. I was
eating. It was not a very simple action. It was a continuous action. Another
example. For example, the verb "کشیدن" means "to drag." But when you have
the compound verb, "سیگار کشیدن" means "to smoke". So you have the verb
"سیگار کشیدن", a compound ver. In order to form a past tense, you
just drop to the "ن" and conjugate it, "سیگار کشیدم". The
verbal part. "سیگار کشیدم". I smoked. Now you want to say that I was smoking.
Then you have "سیگار می کشیدم".
I was smoking. Continuous action in the past. Now
we can use it in a sentence.
من در دانشگاه سیگار می کشیدم.
I was smoking a cigarette at university or at the University. Here it
can have two meanings. If, for example, now I am working, I
don't know, in a factory, for example, but I used to go to university and when I
was in the university, I was smoking. So I can translate it that way, because now I'm
not smoking anymore. So "I used to smoke."
I used to smoke when I was a student. But probably I was
smoking, for example, two hours ago and I'm talking to a friend, that:
من در دانشگاه سیگار می کشیدم.
Two hours ago that I was in the university and I
was smoking. But now I'm not. A continuous action in the past. So
that was the lesson about past continuous or past progressive in Farsi.