How two good friends became sworn siblings — with the revival of an ancient ritual
The Science of Siblings is a new series exploring the ways our siblings can influence us, from our money and our mental health all the way down to our very molecules. We'll be sharing these stories over the next several weeks.
The first time Susan Ashbrook Harvey and Robin Darling Young traveled together in the Middle East, they got very close very quickly. It was 1985, and the two scholars were crammed into a tiny van with several others bound for Tur Abdin, a hilly region in southeast Turkey filled with holy sites.
"We had squeezed ourselves into a dolmish — a van — that was literally full of people. If you know dolmatas [a Greek dish of rice packed tightly into grape leaves], it's the same word," Darling Young says. "We rode down with everybody and her chicken."
On paper, the
