Why is English so unnecessarily complicated? Really, why?
Recently I've been teaching English to a group of Cambodian kids. This is made especially difficult by the fact that they have no concept of verb tenses. No need for the present perfect continuous for them, just a one word modifier: "[before now] I go market". Nice and simple. We have about eight ways of saying that, and yes, each way is subtly different, but eight ways? is that really necessary.
They don't have any concept of modals either. For those that haven't recently spent an unnecessary amount of time on the internet trying to get these clear in their own mind, these are words like could, would and should. Anyone that can explain the point of the word shall is a better man than me. Turns out that there's not really any rules and most modals are pretty much interchanageable with at least one other in at least one context.
And then there's English spelling. Which everyone knows is ridiculous so there's no need to stomp over old ground.
But well done kids, you got the basics. I appreciate that you're still confused by "should" and the difference between the past continuous and the past perfect continuous. But hey, you can direct someone to the bus station and that's infinitely more useful.
English is stupid. Please accept my apologies for it.
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