Antioch

After Palmyra I decided to see Turkey. Not wanting to delay, I got myself to Aleppo in the morning and by the afternoon I was in a taxi to Antioch which usually takes around 3 hours. But the taxi was not going to cooperate. We broke down in the outskirts of the city in the freezing cold, two hours later I was passed off onto another car heading to Antioch. The driver was happy to have me because it meant that he could get two more cartons of cheap Syrian cigarettes through customs. But finally around ten that night I was able to get into the first city in the Old World where the term Christians was used.
Crossing over from Syria into Turkey was like night and day. Turkey is in such better shape that Syria. It almost looks like the west. You can just tell from the get go that things will not be difficult. It is easy, like Europe. Back in 1919 the world powers decided to give Aleppo to Syria rather than Turkey, the Arabs were ecstatic about the decision back then. I wonder how they feel about it now. It would be like if your town could have been part of the U.S. but instead was part of Canada. I know if that was the case for me, I would have been devastated.
The next day I went up to these caves in the rocks were the once persecuted Christians had to hide. Then I went to the Mosaic Museum. It was wonderful. It was amazing what those people could do with little rocks. I included my favorite one here.