Particles wa, ga, and ni in Japanese

The last week we’ve seen some Japanese particles.

The particle “no” and its purposes.

The particles “wa” and “ga“.

It’s time to combine the particles “wa” and “ga” with another particle, I understand it’s difficult and it can get boring, but it’s also important to know. The new particle is “ni“.

Before you begin, you have to remember that “wa” is usually at the beginning of the sentence, “ga” doesn’t follow that rule and this can be a problem.

Let’s begin:

Inu wa niwa ni imasu.

The dog is in the garden

Niwa ni inu ga imasu.

There’s a dog in the garden.

Japanese vocabulary

inu = dog

niwa= garden

So, if you want to understand these particles, you need to ask yourself this:

What is important in the first sentence?

The dog?

The dog is the subject and also the topic of the sentence but it is not the most important thing. The most important thing is that the action takes place in the garden.

In the second sentence, the important thing is that there is a dog in the garden.

Another thing to note about these examples is that “wa” indicates that is something you already know. It’s possible that they were talking about his dog and asked where the dog is.

In the other case, they were in the house, for example, and they saw that there was a dog in the garden.

Another sentence for this topic:

Who is in the garden?

Niwa ni Tatsuo-san ga imasu.

Tatsuo is in the garden.

The same occurs here as in the sentence of the dog. The important thing is to highlight who/what is in the garden…

Where is Tatsuo?

Tatsuo wa hoteru ni imasu.

Tatsuo is in the hotel.

The important thing here is where Tatsuo is, but the topic of conversation is that Tatsuo is marked by the particle “wa“.

Difficult but not impossible, I hope…