Ankara Safety Guide

Ankara's broad boulevards ring with the crisp echo of polished shoes on marble pavement, roasted-chestnut smoke curling from red-ribbed push-carts, and the low call to prayer drifting from Kocatepe's domes. After dusk the capital settles into a polite hush. Yet step beyond the lantern-lit stone of Kızılay or the Citadel's floodlit walls and the grid can still trip up an unfamiliar pair of shoes. Violent crime hardly ever makes the headlines. But nimble fingers work the packed ANKARAY metro and taxi meters sometimes sprint faster than the traffic. Walk like you belong, zip your day-pack shut, and wave off unsolicited help. That is usually all it takes to leave town without a story you'd rather forget. Under the plane trees of Gençlik Park, locals nurse tulip-shaped glasses of black tea while ceiling-mounted cameras sweep the lawns, Ankara's police nerve-center is never more than a radio squawk away. Earthquakes, winter smog and July furnaces each bring their own niggles, yet a modern hospital never sits more than ten minutes from every major square. Photocopy your passport twice, stash the copies in separate pockets, register with your embassy on arrival, and Ankara will repay you with hushed museum corridors, cumin-heavy grills and a slow, breezy spin above the city on Atakule's revolving terrace.