Small grammar point on Pg.11 (Panel 26)
Sorry if this is too basic for everyone (and maybe it’s only ever tripped me up), but on pg.11, panel 26, ドラえもん says 「いた」using the past tense (ta-form) to say he’s found the boy on the plane:
Why use the past tense of a stative verb like いる or ある for a current situation? We can see the kid’s right there, so why not use「いる」? The past tense is clear for an action like 見つける: 見つけた！ (I’ve found it!). But for いる, ある (and adjectives), the ta-form is apparently also used in Japanese to express “discovery and recall”. The group is all looking for that boy, so with that context it seems that it’s more natural for ドラえもん to say いた rather than the neutral いる.