another question (sorry)
is there a present perfect continuous in the passive.
if i say "the building has been used for ten years" it seems to continue, but "it has been built" would be finished. can say "it has been being built for ten years"? or do i just say "they have been building it.."?
by the way, japanese does have more than one tense. it has a clear past tense, and several present ones; both have continuous forms. there are various ways to indicate future. the verb stem actually changes in the "let's" form in a way that might be considered a pure future tense. there is no perfect, however.