Sanctuary

After catching up on sleep post-balloon flight, Marlon and I took a ten-minute walk out of Goreme town proper to see the Goreme Open-Air Museum, a UNESCO World Heritage site.

I'm not the biggest fan of walking, but there is a lot to see along the way, from spiky alien foliage to the cutest little tag-along pups to camel rides (and the quirky signs advertising them).



The open-air museum is a sprawling monastery complex built by early Orthodox Christians between the 8th and 12th centuries.

Exploring the site takes about three hours at a leisurely pace. You can't exactly speed through it since there is a lot of uphill walking and climbing involved.



Like most everything in Cappadocia, these churches, refectories and monasteries were hewn out of rock, taking advantage of the natural shelter afforded by these caves.

It's not just the raw beauty of these rock formations that makes this place a treasure...



 ... but also how they represent a rare successful collaboration between man and Mother Nature. These caves have served as natural vaults for the paintings and decorations made by the early Christian monks, keeping them safe for centuries. (Given the region's bloody and tumultuous history, I'd say they did a pretty good job.)

Inside these rock walls is a truly special site: the Dark Church. For an extra 8 TL (which is well worth it), the stunning frescoes within (some damaged, many still vivid) take you back to what it was like to be a Christian in the 12th century. No photos are allowed inside so this is as far as I can take you.

For a Catholic like myself, the experience was like stepping into an alternate universe (or have I been watching too much Fringe?), a could-have-been. Though we share the same central figures and events as the Orthodox Church, I noticed that the frescoes placed heavy emphasis on saints we barely know—St. Basil and St. George are two of the most important ones.

It made me wonder what history would have been like if the two churches had never parted ways. What would I believe today? Would it have been better for all of us? I guess we'll never really know; the beauty of a place like Goreme is that it helps us imagine, ask, and wonder.