Why is it “у меня нет сестры” and not “сестра”?
Моя семья: мама, папа, брат и сестра
A1 Russian listening practice · Russian · Picked for people who know a little
У меня есть сестра is “I have a sister.” To say you don’t, swap есть for нет, and the missing person or thing changes its ending: у меня нет сестры. That ending is the genitive case, and Russian uses it for anything that is absent. Сестра becomes сестры, брат becomes брата: у меня нет брата.
The same rule works with places and objects: здесь нет метро (“there’s no metro here”), у меня нет времени (“I have no time”). The verb doesn’t change for plural either: у меня нет денег. In the clip the speaker lists mama, papa and brother with у меня есть, then switches to у меня нет сестры and turns the question back: а у тебя?
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Source: wordfreq 3.1.1 (general) · OpenSubtitles 2018 (HermitDave) (spoken). These numbers are close, not perfect.