Editing Van, Turkey (section)

===Landmarks===
[[File:Wan_JPG.jpg|thumb|left|260px|View of the city from Van Castle]]
The modern city is located on the plain extending from the [[Lake Van]], at a distance of {{convert|5|km|0|abbr=off}} from the lake shore. Reports have appeared over the years of a certain [[Lake Van Monster]] said to live in the lake. [[Lake Erçek]] is the second largest lake in the region and lies just east of Lake Van.

Van has often been called "The Pearl of the East" because of the beauty of its surrounding landscape. An old Armenian proverb in the same sense is "Van in this world, paradise in the next".<ref>{{Cite book| last = Hewsen | first = Robert H. |author-link=Robert H. Hewsen | title = Armenia: A Historical Atlas | year = 2001 | publisher = [[The University of Chicago Press]] | isbn = 0-226-33228-4 | pages = 207 }}</ref> This phrase has been slightly modified in Turkish as ''Dünyada Van, ahirette iman'' or "Van for this world, faith for the next".

The city is home to [[Van Yüzüncü Yıl Üniversitesi]] (''Van 100th Year University'') and recently came to the headlines for two highly publicized investigations initiated by the Prosecutor of Van, one of which was focused on accusations against the university's [[Rector (academia)|rector]], [[Hasan Ceylan]], who was kept in custody for a time. He was finally acquitted but lost his rectorate. He is a grandson of [[Güllü Agop|Agop Vartovyan]], an Ottoman Armenian who is accepted as the founder of modern Turkish theatre. Hasan Ceylan is also the department chairman of Environmental Engineering at [[Van Yüzüncü Yıl University]].
[[File:Vankahvalti.jpg|thumb|right|220px| Famous breakfast table in Van]]