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Using present tense to narrate past events

 

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Old December 30, 2017, 03:56 AM
dupond dupond is offline
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Using present tense to narrate past events

Hi everyone

Is it possible in Spanish to use present tense to narrate past events as is sometimes done in English?

I wanted to translate the following sentence:

About six months after John and Mary move in together, John quits his job to become an actor.

My attempt was: Unos seis meses después de que John y Mary se mudan juntos, John deja su trabajo para convertirse en actor.

However, Google translates it as: Aproximadamente seis meses después de que D y J se mudaron juntos, D renuncia a su trabajo para convertirse en actor.

I'm not sure whether the Google translation is correct, but it got me wondering whether I should have used the preterite instead of the present tense. If this is the case, is "renuncia" in the wrong tense in the above sentence?

Thanks
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despues de que, presente histórico, preterite

 

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