Quote Originally Posted by xXHoax View Post
..."At (blank) there is (blank)."...
I think it's easier to understand if you suppose that pattern "у(at/of) subject ..." can mean "subject has ...". It's really how I think about it. It's really derived semantically from idea of "something is in some hands", so he is owning it, like in "у него есть"=>"there is something at him/in his (hands)". But probably there is no better way to translate it to english than "he has". Maybe you can say that in russian mind "is" can mean "has" in such contextes, moreover this "is" can be omitted at the same time.