American English_ Can I use the simple past to talk about life experience without time marker

Question

I know that in the US, people prefer to use the simple past over the present perfect.

Context: I would like to express my opinion about a country and give a recommendation to my friend:

(1) I have visited Thailand . It is a nice country. You should visit it.

(2) I have visited Thailand twice. It is a nice country. You should visit it.

According to my grammar books, I should use present perfect as in (1) and (2).

But when I asked a US speaker, he told me that I also can use the simple past as in (3):

(3) I visited Thailand twice. It is a nice country. You should visit it.

So I wonder, if I can use simple past without the word "twice" as in (4) without time marker or not:

(4) I visited Thailand . It is a nice country. You should visit it.

Answer 1

I'm from the northwest U.S.

It would be rare to hear "I have visited Thailand...." It would be considered formal and would often be used in a declarative or possibly sarcastic sentence.

"I have visited Thailand and found the people hospitable!" my father said stentoriously.

On the other hand, it is common here to hear:

I've been to Thailand.

But it's worth noting that the verb "to be" is abused in this area. In this context, it's synonymous with "I've done that" or "been there, done that."

"I visisted Thailand" (with or without a count of visits) is common, although it sounds funny without a time reference. In other words...

I visited Thailand last year!

would be more common than

I visited Thailand.

Answer 2

Yes, you can use the simple past to talk about life experiences even without a specific time marker, especially if the context of the conversation makes the time frame clear or if the specific timing is not relevant to the point being made. For example, you might say, "I visited Paris" or "I tried sushi," even if you don’t specify when these events occurred. However, in many cases when discussing life experiences more generally or when the timing is not specified, the present perfect tense is typically used, as in "I have visited Paris" or "I have tried sushi." This tense emphasizes the experience up to the present moment.

Answer 3

Sure, that's completely acceptable in American English. For example:

I visited Thailand twice. Once in November and then again in April.

(I'm incorporating the points from the comments into a revised answer)

You can use the simple past even if you remove the word "twice":

I visited Thailand. It is a nice country. You should visit it.

However, in American English, we typically use go instead of visit. Visit sounds extremely formal. So it would be:

I went to Thailand. You should go there, too.

Answer 4

I've visited Thailand twice. Nice country.

states the fact and at the same time presents that fact as relevant.

I visited Thailand twice. Nice country.

When your speaker using the simple past adds "Nice country" they're retroactively making those visits the relevant basis for that judgment. The speaker using the present perfect does so proactively.

P.S. The simple past states a simple fact. The relevance of the fact is implicit in "Nice country", a subsequent remark. The present perfect presents a fact as having relevance as it is being uttered. "twice" or its absence has no bearing on the presentation. Of course, in a conversation about visiting places, the context of the conversation would provide the necessary relevance so that even a statement in the simple past would be understood to have relevance.

When you ask about differences between two utterances in vitro, with no context, rather than in vivo, offering a conversational context, differences that are nearly imperceptible in conversation become magnified under the microscope.