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8-LEVEL UNDERGROUND CITY
Cappadocia in Turkish means the Valley of horses. It’s said that it’s
used to be a lot of horses in the valley.
The most incredible place was underground city. The one we visited next
was said to be one of the largest one with 8 levels. It’s called
Derinkuyu underground city.
While following our guide to enter the city
beneath us, we wouldn’t have realized there’s people walking around or
talking down there until we met other tour group. No wonder, this was a
secure hiding place for early Christians against the Romans and later on
Arab conquerors.
It’s cool inside the cave carved out of solid rock centuries ago. The
cool air is natural as the ventilation system (a hole) is amazingly made
throughout each floor.
One could talk via these holes too. The sound will go to the next level
without trouble for inhabitants to climb up or down the tiring tunnels.
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I love this kind of communication when I tried it
out. ‘Hellooooo…..’ my greeting was echoing to the next
level.
The city was sub-divided into separate sections for better defense
purposes. Rocks were used for closing the doors when they encountered a
raid. Electricity is connected nowadays with yellowish light leading us
level by level. Still we’ve to be extra careful while walking along the
narrow passage to other level.
‘Watch your heads’. One of our members, a tall Japanese guy knocked his
head when our guide just warned us.
The upper level was stables for
animals since animals were more sensitive to alert human beings at once
if somebody broke in. The lowest level was the church in dim light.
We
had to bend ourselves walking hunchback to this lowest level. ‘Looks
like those people living here were shorter than us much more’. I
whispered to Ernie. ‘It’s difficult to come down here because the
Christian made it harder to be intruded when they were having prayers
here’, explained by our guide. |
