In Russian “I have” is expressed by «У меня (есть)» structure. The owner is in the Genitive case.
"The of-case". It is one of the most universal cases. How do you make the forms? Here is the regular pattern:
| ENDING | Genitive sg. | soft stem | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| -a/-я | мама | мамы | земля | земли | |
| zero-ending masc, -о/-е neut | сок / молоко | сока / молока | конь | коня | |
| -ь fem | мышь | мыши |
A zero ending means that the word ends in a consonant or a soft sign (which is just a way to show the final consonant is "soft"). In the Nominative singular, a Russian word can only have the following endings: а, я, о, е, ё or nothing ("zero ending").
If you use «нет» to say that there is "no" something or you do not have it, the object is always in Genitive:
У меня́ есть я́блоко → У меня́ нет я́блока
Здесь есть рюкза́к → Здесь нет рюкзака́.
A huge number of prepositions requires this case. Yes, «у меня есть», «У неё есть» only use «меня» and «неё» because «у» wants Genitive.
For он, она and оно Genitive doubles as a non-changing possessive "his", "her", "their": его, её, их.
A little side note: some nouns of foreign origin are indeclinable. It means that all their forms are the same. Foreign nouns that end in о/е become like that (кофе, метро, радио, резюме), as well as all nouns that do not fit into Russian declension patterns (see above).
This includes female names that end in anything other than А or Я. A few -ь-ending names are an exception (Любовь and Biblical names like Юдифь).
So, all of the following names are automatically indeclinable: Маргарет, Мэри, Элли, Дженни, Рэйчел, Натали, Энн, Ким, Тесс, Жасмин.
Russian also uses the Genitive to state that someone is "away", "not there": Мамы сейчас нет. In English such use would correspond to "There is no mom at the moment", or even "There is no me now". We are not hard on that particular construction in the course, but it is important to know it all the same.
Added bonus: when a verb directly acts on a noun, the noun is called a direct object and is in Accusative. In Russian, only -а/-я feminine nouns have a unique form for it. Others just reuse Genitive or don't change the word at all (Nominative)
Russian uses.... let's call it "consistent" negation. It means that in negative sentences you are required to use "nothing" instead of "anything", "nowhere" instead of "somewhere" and so on. Let's meet the first of these pronouns:
You'll also notice that, unlike standard English, Russian has no rule against using double negatives.