[Jenthepen]

Wait wait wait.

I am completely shocked and blown away.

I have Japanese living language books. In the book it teaches the SOMETHINGがあります。

and SOMETHINGがありますか sentence pattern. It states that it is standard patern when asking if you have something, or stateing that you have something.

I have never took into account that there could possibly be a は instead of が


Why does the book tell me this? As a matter of fact, I've searched many websites, it is all the same thing. They always show the GA in this situation.


Now I though I understood wa and ga. I understood that Ga emphasizes what comes before it. Like saying 彼がアレクスです。 (It is HE who is the one that is alex 'not someone else') But Asside from those uses I always seen in books that GA is always used in the SOMETHING ga arimasu/imasu sentence patterns.

Now you are talking about specific items and non specific items, it is really confusing me even after reading all the replys.

I really wanna get this down, because it seems like there is a huge difference, but I need more explanations, because I am still in the dark about this.

One thing I wanna know is why does my books show in the "asking do you have" section, these examples

水がありますか
マッチがありますか
たばこがあります
本があります

And nowhere in the book does it explain why you use ga, and nowhere have I ever seen anyone use は.