ADMISSION TICKETS TO ANI Once-upon-a-time there was no fee to enter Ani. However, from the early 1990s onwards tickets had to be purchased. Tickets for Ani are sold at a booth beside the Lion Gate, and they can also be purchased in advance at the Kars archaeological museum. Admission to Ani currently costs (2005 prices) five million Turkish Lira (or 5 YTL) for adults (the purple ticket), and two million Turkish Lira (or 2 YTL) for children and those with concessions such as students with ID cards (the yellow ticket). These tickets for Ani do not have a special design and they are identical to those sold at all archaeological sites and museums controlled by the Turkish Ministry of Culture. The Ani ticket scam As you can see from the above pictures, the tickets are in two parts. Actually, the complete tickets are in three parts. At the point of sale one part remains in the ticket book as a record of its sale. The other two parts of the ticket should then be given to the visitor (if there is a separate ticket booth and entrance gate), or only the larger part given (the part marked "be kept during the visit") if there is no separate gate. At Ani there is no separate gate. If you are only given the small part of a ticket at the Ani ticket booth (the part marked "be remained in the control point") then you are being given part of a previously sold ticket, and the man in the booth is simply pocketing your five million Lira! The fraud is very blatant, and has been known about for several years by officials in Kars (it was impossible to hide because there was always a big difference in the number of tickets sold at Ani and the number of people applying for permits to visit Ani). However, it continues unchecked and the same person remains in charge of the ticket booth. Because there is now no permit involved in visiting Ani there is now no independent record of visitor numbers, making the scam even easier to operate. The same scam operates in many Ministry of CUlture sites throughout Turkey. All visitors to Ani should make sure that they are always given the large part of the ticket (the part that is marked "be kept during the visit").

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	All text, images, designs, and intellectual materials are © VirtualANI. This page was first published on the 12th August 2004. It was last modified on the 7th March 2005.