Upon Visiting Cappadocia, Day One

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It was another solitary Sunday morning. I was listening to, but not watching, the live television broadcast of the opening race of the Formula One automobile competition season in Abu Dhabi, waiting for Total Rugby to come on, while playing Buddhist Solitaire (to win, you have to lose)*, when I remembered that the Australian girl I had met on the first day of my tour in Cappadocia was a fan of Formula One racing and would be at the race I was currently not watching. Also, the next leg of the racing circuit would take place in Istanbul. Therefore, I took these presentiments as signs that providence was telling me it was now time to set down my reminiscences of that trip.
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Cappadocia is spelled and pronounced Kapadokya by the Turks. It is a region of fantastic geological and historical wonders in the very center of Turkey, truly unique in the world. (Google “Cappadocia” for images and history -- you will be astounded.) For my Washingtonian readers old enough to remember, the ash-fall from the eruption of Mt. St. Helens in 1980 was mere mist compared to the deluge of ash that covered this region.
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I had arranged my time in Cappadocia to coincide with when Mavis and Herm (see previous Istanbullet) were scheduled to be there, in the unrealized hope that we might possibly meet. I arrived at the airport in Kayseri at around 6:00 am on an April Thursday. Kayseri (pronounced KIE-sa-ree) was known as Caesarea during the Roman times. By the fourth century AD, it had become a focal point of Christian life and faith. St. Basil the Great, who defended church doctrine against heretical movements, was once its leading cleric.
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Due to the early hour, the only choice for getting to my hotel in Urgup (pronounced with umlauts) was an expensive taxi ride. The Urgup Inn Cave Hotel is a small, family run affair, the kind that Rick Steves advocates. (Sorry, Steve, but I discovered it on my own.) After several inquiries by the taxi driver, it was found up a steep, cobbled, one-lane side street. I was greeted by the owner, Omar (who resembled the villain in Nicholas Cage’s 2010 vehicle, “The Sorcerer’s Apprentice”). Omar was so mortified that my travel agent had not contacted him so that I could have taken a much cheaper shuttle van from the airport to the hotel, he gave me the best room in the ancient establishment.
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The premises had originally been a monastery carved out of the side of a hill, long since eroded away, of which my room had been the chapel. It had a high, stone, barrel-vaulted/pointed-arched ceiling, and a huge double bed, the head of which abutted the stonework of a small, recessed altar space. The entrance to the bathroom consisted of a small stone archway that required me to duck upon entry. I cannot remember the number of times that I bashed my head against these stones upon exiting, but they were many.
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After a typical Turkish breakfast (cucumber and tomato slices, white cheese, a freshly boiled egg, warm white bread with butter and a selection of toppings, washed down by way of a pot of tea), I was picked up by the tour van for my first day of being a tourist in a long while. Aboard were six Australians,** (two Muslim couples from Melbourne, and a mother/daughter pair from Sydney -- the daughter being the Formula One fan mentioned above), a Turkish couple, a taciturn American woman, a Canadian from Ontario, myself, and the guide, Ali (female).
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Our morning adventure was the Open-Air Museum outside Goreme (pronounced GOO-re-meh). Summarized quote: “The Goreme Valley holds the largest concentration of rock-cut chapels in Cappadocia. Dating largely from the 9th century onwards, the valley’s 30-some chapels were (carved) out of the soft volcanic tuff.” (Insert: “Tuff” is solidified volcanic ash -- you can scrape it away with a finger.) “Many of the churches feature superb Byzantine frescoes depicting scenes from the Old and New Testaments, and particularly the life of Christ and the deeds of the saints.” Most of these frescos were literally defaced after the Muslim conquest.
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After lunch, we were taken to a rug factory, where we were subjected to a promotional tour. We watched tiny hooded women sitting cross-legged on a cold marble floor tying countless knots into rugs that could take many months to finish, while an overweight, mustachioed and wigged swell in a silk suit, wearing pointed leather shoes, extrapolated on the superiority of Turkish rugs, “which feature two knots at every junction, instead of the single knots of rugs made in other nearby countries.” (I detest these rug hawkers. In Istanbul, they prowl the tourist areas and prey upon old people who are too polite to tell these well-dressed pests to go away. Instead, the victims are followed and badgered until they are intimidated into wasting their valuable touring time among the ancient sites, and are cajoled into a shop where they are given sweet tea, the knot story, etc. Once I figured out this game, I created a solution: when approached and asked, “Where do you come from?”, I reply, “So, you speak English?” “Yes, sir.” “Then, fuck off!” It works every time.)
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There was one part of this exhibition that I found elucidating, however, and that was when we were shown how silk is mechanically removed from the cocoons—it reminded me of the way fishing line is retrieved on a spinning reel. The final stop of the tour was atop a ridge with an awesome (I never use this word casually) view of the region. I slept soundly that night because this was a lightly populated and historically Christian area. There were no police or ambulance sirens, no honking car horns, nor muezzin (the calls to prayer by the Imams, broadcast loudly from speakers atop the minarets that adorn every mosque).
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* It’s a very simple, mindless game I invented as a kid. You are playing YOU against HIM. YOU always play first (I was a kid, OK?). Thoroughly shuffle the cards six times, using different shuffle patterns, but always use the same order of shuffle patterns. (Do you see why I’ve always thought I am mildly autistic?) Lay down 4 cards in an overlapping line. If the 4th card matches the number, face or suit of the 1st card, remove the 2 cards in between. If you get 4 cards of the same suit in a row, remove all 4, unless, by removing cards in twos you can remove more (it will make sense when you try it). Continue laying down/removing cards until they are all gone. If you have 16 or fewer cards left, you “win” and get to repeat the process until you end up with a line of over 16 cards. YOU then add up the total number of points YOU amassed. Now, HE repeats the process. Since the ultimate winner is the one with the fewest points at the end, the ideal hand is 18. The Buddhist aspect which I, of course, did not understand at the time, is that every time YOU “win”, YOU are adding more points to your total. Each win brings YOU ultimately closer to losing.
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** Australians, Germans and New Zealanders are among the most common tourists in Turkey, a by-product of World War I. Turkey sided with Germany because of her ancient antipathetic relationship with Imperial Russia; the Australians and New Zealanders fought against the Turks because they were members of the British Commonwealth. Thousands died. Churchill lost his position as Lord of the Admiralty due to the naval losses in the Dardanelles. Eventually, the Allies withdrew in one of history’s most remarkable retreats: thousands of soldiers were evacuated without a single casualty due to hostile action. History calls the Gallipoli campaign a failure, yet out of it rose three modern, independent nations: Australia, New Zealand and Turkey.
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