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question



kamalnazmi
United Arab Emirates

question
 
hi dear, I �ve got a question..
When I want to use " wish " as a verb , I say:
 
 
I wish you were with me. ( I �m making a wish here)
 
I wish you to be   okay   .  (  to express a desire  I can use wish + to infinitive)
 
but my question is
when I want to ask about someone( his state) now, in the present time,
shall I say :
I wish you were okay.
 
 
or is it fine to say:
I wish you are okay     .       (     since    I �m asking      here      about his  pesent state)

23 Nov 2009      





anne.candan
United Kingdom

Sorry - you can �t say I wish you to be OK, nether can you say I wish you are OK.
 
When you use wish we are talknig about hypothetical situations. Even if we are talking about the present you have to say I wish you were OK.
 
However in this situation the person is NOT OK.
 
If you don �t know if the other person is OK or not, then you don �t use wish - you �d say I hope you are OK.
 
Anne

23 Nov 2009     



jessica farias
Argentina

You can use the verb "Wish" to express something you would like to change or be different about a situation.  If you refer about something in the present your wish must be in the past; if the fact is about the past the wish should be in the past perfect tense (you go a tense back)

I wish I were taller (I am short)
I wish I had gone to university. ( I didn �t go to university)

Hope it helps.

Jessica

24 Nov 2009     



kamalnazmi
United Arab Emirates

So it �s better in this case for a person to say: I hope you are OK. In fact this is exactly what I �m looking for , because I �m quite sure about the use of past tenses when using the verb " wish" . But I wanted to make sure that in such a case when we don �t know whether the second person is OK now or not, we can use another verb like " hope" but wish is certainly unaccepted. ,,
You did me a big favour guys .I �m really thankful.

24 Nov 2009