In my Japanese class, I've been taught that the structure for "to think" is "~と思う", but no explanation was given for why this is the way it is.
For instance:
日本の中で食べ物は高いと思う。
Obviously the first part of the sentence reads, "In Japan, food is expensive" - but the last part doesn't seem to make sense in-context. Maybe it's because I haven't seen grammar structures with multiple verbs before.
さけおさんは酒を飲まないと思う。
This sentence has effectively the same structure as above, but the ending of the sentence just... doesn't sound right. It doesn't make logical sense given the grammar rules that I know so far.
How should I break this sentence down so I can hear this intuitively? Is the form "~と思う" part of a larger type of grammar that I am not yet aware of?
Additionally, I've never seen the particle と used this way before. What does it mean here?