Last night I was helping my son with his Chinese homework. The subject was time, e.g. last month, this month, next month, yesterday, today, tomorrow, past and future, etc.
To explain time, I drew an axis. In English, time is coming towards us from the front as if we are facing upriver. In Chinese, we face the past, as if looking downriver, since the past is visible to us, but the future is not yet visible. Yesterday came in front of Today, and Tomorrow will come after Today. Therefore in Chinese, we say the past is “in front” of the future which is coming “afterward”.
In my family it is no surprise that we see things from two different points of view. Anyway, China has a long history so there is a lot to see in the past.
