I am en route to Istanbul now with a layover, at this moment, as we speak, in London’s Heathrow airport.   I’ll be in Turkey for nearly three weeks.   This is a trip sponsored by my home institution, the General Alumni Association of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.   As is true of most universities, UNC has a vibrant travel program for alumni.   Trips can be on the expensive side, but they are usually fantastic.  As the guest lecturer, I get a free trip out of it. There are four people connected with the blog on the trip (maybe more: but there are four that I know of so far).  (It may seem strange, but one does not have to be an alum of the university to go on an alumni trip!)   It is intentionally a small group, just twenty-five of us. Turkey is one of the great places on earth, with a massive and varied cultural history.   My lectures concern only one small part of the Turkish legacy.  As it turns out, this [...]