Travel and Tourist Transactions
Asking for a room, a ticket and a price, and the two short Turkish words - var and yok - that answer almost every question a traveller asks.
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Gişede 🎫
Almost every question a traveller asks is really the same question: **is there one?** Is there a room, is there a ticket, is there a bus at six. English needs four or five words for that. Turkish needs two, and one of them is the answer as well as the question. Learn those two words and you can hold a transaction on your first day.
Key words 🗂️
Six words a traveller needs. Two more you can already read: **pasaport** and **otel** mean exactly what they look like, so they are worth knowing but not worth testing.
Match each word to its meaning
- bilet
- anahtar
- gişe
- boş
- ticket
- key
- ticket window
- free, not taken
var and yok ✅
**var** means there is, or there exists. **yok** means there is not. They are not two halves of a verb. yok is its own word, and either one on its own is a complete answer: ask **Boş oda var mı?** and you will hear back **Var.** or **Yok.** To turn var into a question, put **mı** after it: var mı? That is the whole trick. Turkish has no word for "a" and needs no word for "is", so **boş oda var** is, word for word, *free room exists*.
What is being asked? 🛎️
You arrive at a small hotel and ask: Boş oda var mı? What have you said?
- Is there a free room?
- I would like to pay for a room
- Where is my room?
- The room is empty
The rule 📝
Turkish says _____ for "there is" and _____ for "there is not". To make it a question you add _____ after var. So "Is there a ticket?" is _____, and a shopkeeper who has none simply answers _____.
Longer in English ↔️
One more thing worth knowing before you use it. **yok is not the same as hayır.** hayır is "no" as a refusal. yok means "there is not any of it" - which is the answer you will actually get in a shop, and it is not rude.
Order the exchange 🔀
An interactive activity.
Which are right? 🧮
Select the TWO sentences that are correct Turkish.
- Bilet var mı? for "Is there a ticket?"
- Oda yok. for "There are no rooms."
- Oda değil var. for "There are no rooms."
- Bir bilet var mı? where bir is needed to mean "a"
Otelde 🧭
An interactive activity.
The summary 🖊️
A ticket is _____ and a key is _____. The word for free or not taken is _____. To ask how much something costs you say _____. And the word a shopkeeper uses to tell you they have run out is _____, which is not the same as saying no.
Your turn ✍️
An interactive activity.