Carolyn Frantz

Turkey

In modern-day Turkey, Ephesus is an archaeological site that was a cosmopolitan metropolis in Roman times. Its claim to fame is the Library of Ephesus, one of the greatest libraries of the ancient world. My journey to Ephesus as part of class trip in graduate school wasn’t just a journey to another part of the world- it was a trip back in time. Standing on the sites of ancient libraries, theaters, various temples, mansions, and Roman baths, I imagined myself as a citizen of Rome. We stayed in the nearby contemporary town of Selcuk, where I learned about which foods were in season at that time, the daily rhythms of life in a Muslim country, and how to be polite in Turkish culture. I also learned to love Turkish coffee! For me the highlight was visiting the Cave of Paul and Thecla, which contains the earliest known portrait of St. Paul (pictured). By the end of the trip, I better understood a society a world-­ and nearly two millennia­- away.