Change of viewpoint in mid-sentence A man has just returned home to his wife and says: > > > Today, I went to the sparrow's house and (ate) delicious food and (came and) saw a sparrow dance. In the first half of the sentence he moved away from his current viewpoint (which makes sense, but in the second half doesn't suggest that he is at the sparrow's house when he is speaking (I came and saw)? Why is it not ? I also don't understand why either or is actually needed here. Doesn't in the first half of the sentence provide all the coming and going information needed? Lastly, I read the sentence literally to mean "saw both a sparrow dance and delicious food". I'm assuming that the "eating" is somehow implicit. But it could equally well be "cooked delicious food" for example. Am I missing any subtleties here?

is the te-form of the verb + (), the subsidiary verb () . It's used for "went (and came back)" or "have (just) been to", e.g.

> I've just been to the post office.

* * *

> []{}[]{}[]{}[]{}[]{}

It literally says "Today, I went to the sparrow's house, saw delicious dishes and sparrow dance, and came back." (The []{} here is not inn but house; when ojiisan sings "suzume, suzume, oyado wa dokoda?" he's looking for the little sparrow's house, not their inn.)

But as you can see, the writer intended to say "Today, I went to the sparrow's house, ate delicious dishes, saw sparrow dance, and came back."

I'm not sure this is grammatically "correct" (actually I think it's probably sloppy/wrong) but, we often say and hear sentences like this in daily conversation, or sometimes even in tv drama:

> * I drank bread and coffee for breakfast, and...
> * I ate juice and cake for snack.
> *
>