Throughout its life as a church, then mosque and now museum, Istanbul’s Hagia Sophia has remained a grand and dignified beacon. Each year, thousands of people arrive to view its Byzantine beauty and take in the domes and pillars, mosaics and minarets, just as Francis and I did in 2011. And quite unexpectedly, (but just like the occasion at Monsoon Palace in Udaipur, India), I met a cat. There, among the sumptuous decor, sat the most nonchalant of cross-eyed feline squatters, tolerating the human traffic and waiting for the sun to shift so that there’d be a warm place to lie. Not a bad place to while away your time, really.

Have you ever encountered any unexpected residents — feline or other?