Ta Bakari vs Ta Tokoro: Saying You Just Did Something in Japanese

Two ways to say just did

Both forms attach to the plain past tense of a verb, the ta form: tabeta bakari, tabeta tokoro, kita bakari, kita tokoro. After that they behave like nouns: add desu to be polite, da in casual speech, or nothing at all. The grammar is easy. The difficulty is the meaning.

Ta bakari looks backwards from the speaker's point of view. It says: this happened recently, and that recency explains something, such as why I am still unsure of the office, why the paint is wet or why I am not hungry. Because it is about feeling rather than measurement, the gap can be anything from a minute to a year. Joining a company last month is bakari. Eating lunch last month is not.

Ta tokoro looks at the clock. It says the action has just this moment reached its end. The speaker is still where it happened and nothing else has yet occurred.

Ta bakari: recent in your mind

The word bakari also means only or nothing but, and that colour survives in ta bakari. When you say hajimeta bakari desu, I have only just started, you are making a small excuse or setting expectations. That is why ta bakari is so common in self-introductions and apologies: it explains a gap in knowledge or a lack of progress.

The recency scale stretches with the size of the event. Buying a coffee is recent for a few minutes. Moving house is recent for a few months. Getting married or starting a business is recent for a year or more. Native speakers pick the form by how fresh the change feels, not by counting days, so kyonen umareta bakari no akachan, a baby born only last year, is perfectly natural.

Ta bakari often connects to a following clause with de or na node to give the reason, and it sits in front of nouns as ta bakari no.

Ta tokoro: this very moment

Tokoro literally means place, and the three tokoro forms describe where you are in an action. Ta tokoro is the finishing line. The speaker has just crossed it and is reporting from the spot. Because of that, ta tokoro cannot describe anything that happened before now, and it cannot be combined with past time words such as kinō, sakki or senshū.

Ta tokoro is very common in two situations: answering a phone or message with where you are, and the moment someone walks in, ima owatta tokoro desu, I just finished. Chōdo, exactly, adds emphasis. Ima and chōdo do not compete with ta tokoro; they reinforce it. In casual speech you will hear the clipped toko, as in ima tsuita toko.

Ru tokoro and te iru tokoro: before and during

The same tokoro attaches to the dictionary form and the te iru form to mark the moments before and during an action. Ru tokoro means you are about to start: your hand is on the door handle, the kettle is boiling, you have not yet begun. Te iru tokoro means you are in the middle of it: half the report is written, the pan is on the heat.

These three forms are a matched set. If a friend asks whether you have eaten, you can answer with ima taberu tokoro, tabete iru tokoro or tabeta tokoro depending on the state of your plate. All three usually take ima or chōdo, because they describe the present moment.

Ru tokoro is also a polite way to decline without saying no: ima kara dekakeru tokoro na node, I'm just about to go out, so. Te iru tokoro is what you say when someone calls at a bad time. Both leave the listener to draw the conclusion.

Ima, sakki and the tokoro forms side by side

Ima means now and covers this moment and the near future. Sakki means a little earlier, anything from a few minutes to a couple of hours ago. Neither word says whether an action is finished, ongoing or about to start, which is what the tokoro forms add. The table shows which combinations sound natural.

Notice the last two rows. Sakki and kinō both push the action into the past, and ta tokoro refuses to go there. Swap in bakari and the sentence is fine. Going the other way, bakari happily takes ima as well: ima kita bakari desu is a natural answer when someone asks whether you have been waiting long.

Register: polite, casual and written

All of these forms work at every politeness level, because the level lives in what follows. Ta bakari desu and ta tokoro desu are standard polite speech for the office, the clinic and the phone. Ta bakari da and ta tokoro da are casual, and dropping the copula entirely, as in tsuita toko, is friendly and quick.

For humble and honorific speech, change the verb, not the pattern. Tadaima modorimashita, I'm back, is the set phrase for returning to the office, and tokoro attaches to the plain form, not the masu form.

In writing, ta bakari appears in emails and reports without any change. Ta tokoro is more spoken and tends to appear in dialogue, chat messages and phone calls. In formal written Japanese you will more often see ta tokoro de aru or the pattern ta tokoro, followed by a result, meaning upon doing X.

• Polite speech: tsuita tokoro desu, hajimeta bakari desu
• Casual speech: tsuita tokoro, tsuita toko, hajimeta bakari da yo
• Text messages: ima tsuita toko, sakki okita bakari
• Office return: tadaima modorimashita, or ima modotta tokoro desu
• Formal writing: ta bakari de aru, ta tokoro de aru

Common mistakes and how to fix them

The most frequent error is using ta tokoro for something that is no longer this moment. Kinō Nihon ni kita tokoro desu sounds like a contradiction to a Japanese ear; make it kita bakari desu. The reverse error is milder: ta bakari for something you literally finished a second ago is acceptable, it simply loses the sense of right now that tokoro would give.

Second, learners attach tokoro to the wrong verb form. Taberu tokoro, tabete iru tokoro and tabeta tokoro are the only three options; tabemasu tokoro and tabete tokoro do not exist. Third, watch the state verbs. Shitte iru, to know, and sunde iru, to live, describe ongoing states, so sunde iru tokoro does not mean I am in the middle of living. Use ta bakari with these: Tōkyō ni sumihajimeta bakari desu, I only just started living in Tokyo.

Finally, ta bakari carries a hint of only or excuse, so repeating it after every achievement can sound apologetic. To simply report good news, plain past tense with saikin, recently, is often more natural: saikin kekkon shimashita.