Today I will cover a new topic on “Arimasu (Have)”. When using “Arimasu”, the sentence will be a little different when translating them into English.

Here we go
Q : Do you have books? – Hon ga arimasu ka?　「ほん が あります か？」
A : Yes, I have books – Hai, hon ga arimasu　「はい、ほん が あります」

Notice that there isn’t any you (anata) or I (watashi) in the sentences when we use Japanese. This is because we are asking some one a question whether they have books or not. So Japanese will skip or in fact we cannot use the “Anata or Watashi” in the sentence. In English, it is a little funny if we skip the “You” and will end up something like “Have Books?”.

You may also notice the “ga” as all the lessons I have posted before are using “wa”. Many people who study Japanese confuse about the usage of “wa” and “ga” and I will explain on the proper usage of these 2 particles tomorrow.

Q : Do you have a camera? – Kamera ga arimasu ka?　「カメラ が あります か？」
A : No, I don’t have a camera. – Iie, kamera wa arimasen.　「いいえ、カメラ は ありません」

In the above example, you may notice the question is using “ga” and answer is “wa”. When a question word such as “who” and “what” is the subject of a sentence, it is always followed by “ga”, never by “wa”. To answer the question, it also has to be followed by “ga” if it is positive. If the answer is negative, then we must change the “ga” to “wa”.

Example
Q : What do you have? – Nani ga arimasu ka?　「なに が あります か」
A : I have a ticket. – Kippu ga arimasu　「きっぷ が あります」
Meaning : Kamera (Camera), Nani (What), Kippu (Ticket)

Stay tune for tomorrow lesson on the use of “ga” and “wa” which is one of the most important and confusing particles use in Japanese Language.