Learn Romanian: Telefonul este acolo.

Romanian actually attaches "the" to the end of the noun instead of putting it at the beginning! Here, the base word is telefon (phone). The -ul at the end is the definite article ("the"), making it telefonul (the phone).

Why does telefon take the -ul ending specifically?

Telefon is a neuter noun ending in a consonant. In Romanian, most masculine and neuter singular nouns that end in a consonant take the suffix -ul to mean "the".

Is este the only way to say "is" here?

Este is the standard, full word for "is" (the 3rd-person singular of the verb a fi, meaning "to be"). In casual, spoken Romanian, you will also frequently hear it shortened to just e, making the sentence Telefonul e acolo.

What if I wanted to say "The phone is here" instead of "there"?

To say "here", you would replace acolo (there) with the word aici (here). The sentence would then be Telefonul este aici.