Saint Sophia, the church of the divine wisdom, this was their crowning glory---the glory of Byzantium.

 

The vanished empire of Byzantium born of pagan Rome.

 

Byzantium, the dream of a Christian Roman empire that stretched from Spain to Syria.

 

Byzantium, whose influence ran from Northern Russia down to Nubia upon the upper Nile.

 

Byzantium, gateway to a lost chapter of our past.

 

The Orient Express, I first traveled this line in the 60s.  I bought a ticket at Waterloo station in London for a ride to Istanbul in Turkey in a life-long fascination.

 

It took three days to get there with hell on wheels really, goats in the corridor and communism out of the window.

 

Then all of a sudden the trains run around a bend and bang, the orient hit me in the face, the great golden city by the sea set between the east and west, you could see it had been the center of the world.  It was astonishing.

 

I come to Istanbul, and underneath, the magic ruins of the lost empire of Byzantium.

 

The Orient Express stopped here in the heart of the old city. I got off it in clouds of smoke and steam, haunted by the ghost of Greta Garbo and Agatha Christie by a thousand spies and archaeologists, by the kings and courtesans, the prewar Europe.