Learn Turkish: Lokantada mercimek çorbası yok. - There is no lentil soup in the restaurant.

This is how Turkish links two nouns together to make a specific compound noun. In English, we just put two words together: "lentil soup." In Turkish, the first noun (mercimek) stays plain, but the second noun gets a possessive suffix, almost like saying "lentil its-soup" (mercimek çorbası).

Why is there an s in çorbası?

The base word for soup is çorba, which ends in a vowel. The 3rd person possessive suffix here is -ı. To prevent two vowels from crashing together, Turkish uses s as a buffer letter, making it çorbası.

Why does lokantada come at the very beginning of the sentence?

In Turkish, sentences that state whether something exists or doesn't exist (using var or yok) usually start with the location or time. So the structure is literally "In the restaurant, lentil soup doesn't exist."

Why use yok instead of değil here?

Yok means "there is not" or "does not exist," which is exactly what you need when a restaurant is out of soup. Değil means "is not" and is used to negate a description, like Çorba sıcak değil (The soup is not hot).