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CITY GUIDE / 10 discovery ideas

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Gaziantep.

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1. Culture & art

   Visit the Archaeological Site of Zeugma

   Most of this Roman city on the Euphrates went under the Birecik dam; the mosaics that could be saved are in the museum in Gaziantep. In the year the water rose, archaeologists worked day and night and got the Gypsy Girl out. What remains shows the villa foundations and the waterline. Photograph it.

2. Culture & art

   Visit the Yesemek Quarry and Sculpture Workshop

   Yesemek's unfinished sculptures reveal stages in turning stone into art. Türkiye's UNESCO tentative-list submission describes roughly shaped pieces being taken to other cities for their final details. From the visitor path, compare a lion roughout with a less worked block and photograph them; record which detail you think the sculptor would leave until last.

   Story and sources →
3. Food · Şahinbey

   Eat hot baklava at İmam Çağdaş in Gaziantep

   Eat classic, high-pistachio baklava fresh from the hands of 70-year-old masters — and photograph it.

4. Food · Şahinbey

   Start the day with beyran soup

   Try beyran, the morning soup of the Karkamış region — spicy, with lamb, in the traditional style — and photograph it.

5. City discovery · Şehitkamil

   Stand in a pistachio grove at harvest

   The nut that gives Antep baklava its colour is beaten from the trees in September and comes down onto sheets in a green rain. Get to a grove while it is happening — and photograph it.

6. Nature

   Visit Sof Mountain Yayla

   Visit Sof Mountain Yayla near Gaziantep — and photograph it.

7. Food · Şahinbey

   Have a katmer breakfast in the morning

   Eat Antep's special clotted-cream-and-pistachio katmer fresh from the oven in the morning — and photograph it.

8. History · Şehitkamil

   See the 'Gypsy Girl' at the Zeugma Mosaic Museum

   Behold the world-famous Gypsy Girl unearthed at Belkıs/Zeugma, at the world's largest mosaic museum — and photograph it.

   Story and sources →
9. History · Şahinbey

   Wander Antep's Coppersmiths' Bazaar

   Watch the still-active copper workshops in the historic han; haggle with the mother-of-pearl inlayers and spice sellers — and photograph it.

10. Food · Şahinbey

    Drink menengiç, the coffee with no coffee in it

    Roasted terebinth berries ground and brewed with milk make a thick, nutty cup that looks like coffee and contains none — an Antep habit older than the bean. Order one in the bazaar — and photograph it.