The Ottoman Turks did not gain control of the city until 1453.As the only Orthodox priest in Istanbul with English as a first language, Fr Tarasios does a lot of translation work. In the afternoons he takes visitors on tours of the churches in Fener Before leaving the Patriarchate, he must change into a suit. One day I'm going to write a book and call it A Texan in Constantinople," he laughs. His grandparents emigrated from Greece to the United States, where Fr Tarasios became an Orthodox priest "People ask me why I came here In the US I had everything: my own house, a nice car But what I didn't have was to be at the centre of Orthodoxy. Now I've become a part of everything I read about."The Patriarch of Constantinople is the spiritual head of the world's Orthodox churches. But while he is spiritual leader to nearly 300 million Christians worldwide, today the Patriarch's own diocese of Greek Christians in Istanbul has dwindled to only 3,000.Istanbul was once legendary for its mix of races and Greeks still call it by its old Greek name, Constantinople But today the Greeks are leaving.

One of them, Father Tarasios, preaches in Greek but his first language is English. "I grew up in Texas. In the middle of this sprawling city of more than 10 million Muslims, the Patriarch of Constantinople is celebrating Holy Communion, as his predecessors have done for almost 2,000 years The Patriarch is usually assisted by his two deacons. With anti-Semitism on the rise in Russia and a growing neo-fascist movement, this could not be more relevant. For Todorovsky, differences of race and creed are unimportant and there are only two nationalities: those who hate and those who love.. IT IS Ramadan in Istanbul and the Islamic call to prayer echoes over the city. But on Sunday mornings, mingled with the Arabic chanting, the sound of church bells can be heard.

Yet he loves foreign cinema, especially British films.Todorovsky first made his name with a 1991 movie called Love about a romance between a Russian boy and a Jewish girl. It takes at least a year to make a film and you need audiences with money in their pockets to enjoy it Now, it seems we are back at square one Yet, I remain an optimist I love my profession. I cannot live with the feeling that everything is over," he said.For the time being, he is surviving by making films for television, based on the detective novels of Alexandra Marinina, a policewoman turned popular thriller writer.He rejects the idea of emigrating, as he says a film-maker needs to work in his own language. Much of the action takes place on a boat that is normally a floating restaurant on the Moscow River.