but certainly, the spoken language is not quite so super-humanly inaccessible as our Portuguese friend suggests. He will eat and then leave. after he eats, He will leave. After he ate, he left. after the students finished their work They handed it to the teacher. The one that follows the first verb indicates sequence. The one that follows the second verb or its object indicates that the sequence is complete, and by implication, past. I didn't go home for winter break. I didn't see him at all yesterday. I've already read today's paper. I have already climbed the Great Wall. I have never eaten Chinese food before. He has never ridden on a plane before. Today we’re going to talk about component instance versus definition. I threw him the steak. He swallowed it down in one big gulp. I waited around for 10 minutes.