Two 了s

xiao_liang

June 08, 2010, 11:16 AM posted in Grammar Questions

Hiya I posted this in a lesson conversation, but it didn't get picked up by staff. I found the sentence 我忘了买肉了 - wǒ wàng le mǎi ròu le - "I forgot to buy meat". Why are there two 了 in this sentence? Would 我忘了买肉 not suffice? or 我忘买肉了? Could someone explain?

xiao_liang

June 08, 2010, 11:22 AM

Oh my god! What the hell happened? How do I delete the other 9 versions of this post?????

xiao_liang

I can't?! Why can I not delete my posts?! Help!

xiao_liang

Christ. Really sorry everyone.

xiao_liang

p.s. Cpod. You REALLY need to sort out how to delete your own posts. Seriously. And you're getting rid of the "posts" page? Are you crazy?

paulinurus

didnt you use the pencil icon to delete? see catherineem's post. or maybe the crap board striked again!

xiao_liang

You can only delete comments, not original posts :-( The pencil icon just takes you to the "edit post" page, which doesn't seem to have an option to delete. Unless I missed it.

catherinem

I just posted under your other comment but I'll say it here too:

We know this is a problem and we are working to make sure users have the publish/unpublish on their edit post page. This is being worked on as we speak and will allow users to delete their posts. Thank you for your patience.

catherinem

The accidental posts have been cleared.

lujiaojie

我忘了买肉了 "忘" is a special verb, the first "了" like a "complement" and don't indicate "completed", so we need a "了“ at the end of sentence.

xiao_liang

Thanks for the update Catherine!

xiao_liang

Thanks for the help lujiaojie - so 忘 always takes 了? Much appreciated!

lujiaojie

Not always. You can say:

我忘（了）带钥匙了。我忘（了）买东西了。别忘了带钥匙。别忘了买东西。

我忘买肉了 also good.

xiao_liang

Oh. I'm confused now. So it's optional?

lujiaojie

我忘（了）带钥匙了。我忘（了）买东西了。 The first 了 can be omit.