Day 5 & 6 continued! Caves and Underground Cities
Trip Start
Jun 28, 2009
1
8
16
Trip End
Jul 11, 2009
Guzelyurt,
Cappadocia,
Turkey
Saturday, July 4, 2009
Day 5 & 6, Churches in Caves and Cities Underground
While we were in Cappadocia, we had two activities which involved the “cave culture” which evolved out of the natural geology of the landscape. As I mentioned before, Cappadocia was given its unique appearance because of a very specific kind of volcanic ash which formed into rock. The Goreme Outdoor Air Museum is an area of the caves that existed in the side of a mountain which was originally a Christian monastery and contains many small “churches.” (To you and me, they are small caves.) Each church was carved into the mountain and inside are painted with natural paint. In some of them, there were also frescoes.
When the Moslems conquered Byzantium, they vandalized many of the churches in a way that is creepy but understandable; they leave the painting in tact, but gouge out the eyes of it subject
Kami and I in a cave house
. In Islam, as I understood it, people are taught that Allah is always watching them and that the walls always have eyes. Therefore, the Moslems had a very hard time with the eyes on Christian iconography and didn’t like the idea of Jesus or any of the saints “staring” at them as they prayed in their own way. Muslims believe that despite the fact that Jesus was a prophet, the Bible is a corrupt book and the Koran “corrects” it. The Koran, to Muslims, is considered the “last book.” (This was explained to us by an imam, whom we met with yesterday.)The Open Air Museum was very hot and sunny but still bearable. Just as we were getting to the sunniest spot, there was some cloud cover and an accompanying breeze. Thank you, Allah! After checking out the churches, Erica and I headed down to the place where you could pay to sit on and/or ride a camel. When I asked Erica if she was going to pose on the camel, she said, “Heck yeah!” which I later modified to “Hell to the evet.” (“Hell to the (Turkish) yes.”)
The end of that day was followed by the carpet demonstration which I already wrote about. I highly recommend an air-conditioned carpet showroom and a glass of wine after hanging out in the mountain sun for a morning.
The next day, we had the choice to stay at the Old Greek House until 11, then go to the local farmers’ market or go on a 4-5 mile hike through the brush. Erica, a few others and I opted for the former and were very glad we did. The hike was through a brambly area with swollen creeks in the hot sun and humidity
Other Stephanie in a cave house
. On top of that, it was recommended that everyone wear long sleeves and pants. Erica and I walked through the farmer’s market, which was half open air flea market, half foods and then opted to go the hotel across the street . She had a glass of wine and wrote in her journal and I had a cup of tea and used the WiFi. That was our idea of a hike.After our stinky compatriots met the bus (almost 45 minutes late), we all went to lunch and then on to the Underground City. The Underground City is on the outskirts of Cappadocia and was constructed in order to hide all of the citizens from invaders. It was an extremely intricate and well-planned city, with its own ventilation system, security doors (aka stone wheels and secondary exits), a communal kitchen with special “vents” to hide smoke, room for animals and individual caves for families. During winter, the city is nice and warm and in summer, nice and cool. The man who led us through was an elderly local. He wore a dress shirt and jacket, and in the old-fashioned Turkish way, used the phrase “excuse me” every time he had to reference toilets or waste. For example, “In this way, the people were able to use the, excuse me, toilets and dispose of the, excuse me, waste.” Very cute.
Creeping through the cave was a lot of fun and only a teeny bit claustrophobic. You know a cave ceiling is small when even I can barely stand upright. One man on our tour, Charles, is well over six feet tall and we all had to make special room for him in each room. He would sit down on ledges or stand in a hole so as not to bump his head. At some point in each of the underground caves, each of us probably bumped our heads at least once. I was saved by my headband when it happened to me
Underground city
. I think short people take for granted that we’ll breeze on through, but that’s not the case.When we got outside, there was more Turkish crap for sale: evil eye key chains, evil eye pins, evil eye bracelets, plus clothes, a million different bags, postcards, bookmarks, machine-made pottery, “Building 19” earrings, scarves, scarves and more scarves. I can’t even list all the stuff; it all looks the same after awhile. Oh wait! That’s because it is all the same.
If you want to buy cool Turkish stuff, go to any of the state-run artists cooperatives, the Spice Market or local markets, like a farmers market or the market near the city wall where the locals go. Other than that, it’s like any tourist trap gift shop - not that I didn’t buy anything there - but you know what I mean… After all, I am a tourist.
