那七点半就应该到家了 可这都十一点多了
“He should have been home by 7:30. But it's past 11 already.”
THE DIALOGUE REEL
回玉县了
“He went back to Yu County?”
那七点半 就应该 到家了 可这都十一点多了
“He should have been home by 7:30. But it's past 11 already.”
那会不会是县里有急事
“Maybe something urgent came up in the county.”
“Something must be wrong; a four-hour delay cannot be normal.”
In close Chinese relationships, unexplained time gaps violate the expectation of mutual transparency and provoke immediate communal anxiety.
LEARNING CHUNKS & PARTICLES
it is already...
Used to express impatience, worry, or surprise that a certain deadline or time threshold has passed.
should have already
Indicates an unmet expectation based on standard schedules or logic.
Marks the completion of time passing and reinforces the speaker's heightened sense of urgency.
VOCABULARY & EXPRESSIONS
Parallel Spoken Cinema Scenes (语义近邻切片)
“You should arrive this morning. What time is it? It's dinner time. Where did you go?”
“- I thought that it would end by 15:30. - Okay. I was late for over an hour.”