Business Small Talk (1): Are VS Come



When you have a small talk with your customer, when you want to know where he or she is from, will you say something like:


Where are you come from?




You may still get an answer from your customer, yet he or she will think that you speak strange English.



How strange is it?  You speak something that is not to be found in English.   
Why?




What’s wrong with ‘Where are you come from?’

There is one problem with it.  What is it?  Read the sentence again and pay attention to the two words bold.


Where are you come from?



Do you know there is a hidden rule in English?  What is it?  You can’t put the two verbs ‘are’ and ‘come’ together in a simple sentence.  That is, try to think about the two verbs as the two big names in smart phones, Apple & Samsung.    






If ‘are’ belongs to Apple, then ‘come’ belongs to Samsung.  The two verbs are simply incompatible



Are VS Come





If you still don’t get it.  Read the following answer from a non-westerner:

I am come from New York.  




Think about a simple sentence as a simple relationship.  So if ‘I’ is a man (probably a handsome one), then ‘am’ and ‘come’ are two women.   In the sentence (relationship) there are two women (are VS come) in love with one man (I).  The relationship may probably end up in a disaster:











What are you going to do with the situation?

I am not an expert of love, but what I know is you may just separate the two verbs (two women) and put them into two types of sentences:



Women (1)
Where are you from?
I am from London.

Women (2)
Where do you come from?
I come from London.



So a peaceful world with good English!  





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