A whirling dervish at a performance during Ramzan at Binbirdirek Hall in Istanbul. Dervishes are adherants of Sufism, a mystical form of Islam that preaches tolerance and a search for understanding. Those who whirl, like planets around the sun, turn dance into a form of prayer. Some say the whirling dervishes belong more to the central, conservative city of Konya, where the father of Sufism, Mevlana Jalaluddin Rumi, lived in the 13th century, than to the cosmopolitan modern city.

Photographs: Mustafa Ozer/AFP/Getty Images