"I have been speaking Esperanto since the year two thousand."

Translation: Mi parolas Esperanton ekde la jaro du mil.

[gameboy86]

Why is in't it "Mi parolis Esperanton ekde la jaro du mil" ?

[mizinamo]

That would be "I had been speaking Esperanto since the year two thousand (until the period in time that we happen to be talking about now".

You're still speaking Esperanto, right? So the present tense is correct. English uses the present perfect, Esperanto (like e.g. German) the simple present.

[Rippler]

If we went by Latin rules, whose perfect tense can act as simple past or present perfect, it would be right.

[gamehelp16]

Hovering the word "been" gives "estis + participle", Duolingo haven't taught me about participles and this sentence appears :/

[PetziPotato]

Can't it be "Mi parolas Esperanton ekde la du mila jara"?
What's the correct ordinal for "du mil"?

[mizinamo]

In my experience, Esperanto uses cardinal numbers for years, like e.g. English and German, not ordinal numbers, like e.g. Russian.

So they would say, for example, that "Zamenhof was born in 1859" or "Zamenhof was born in the year 1859", not "Zamenhof was born in the 1859th year".

[domsalazar0]

In the previous lessons they insist that it must be la Esperanton, and mark me wrong for leaving "la" off... so why are they changing their tune on that now?

[salivanto]

Could you please provide a link or screenshot to a sentence that insists on "La Esperanton"? I have been unable to turn up a sentence like that using search.

[jbrock64]

Could you say mi parolanta esperanton ekde la jaro du mil I'm kind of new at this tense

[salivanto]

Parolanta is an adjective. You wouldn't say Mi parolanta any more than you would say "Mi blua."

In addition, it carries more of an active sense -- as in, you're in the state of actually speaking - so "Mi estas parolanta Esperanton" means that you're in the state of actively speaking Esperanto -- not just that speaking Esperanto is something that you do, even on a regular basis.

So "Mi parolas Esperanton ekde 2000" is the right way to say that.

[jbrock64]

Ok got it kion vi faras nun ? Mi estas parolanta esperanton kun lin . Dankon por via helpo