Sunday, March 28/2010

Up very early a)because the time has changed in the night to daylight savings and b)because the Australian Grand Prix begins at 7 (old time 6 of course). Not only hard to wake up but hard to stay awake, so some brief lapses, but a much better race than two weeks ago. Chorizo sausage and red pepper tortilla for brunch, courtesyof Waitrose's mark down.

In the afternoon we go by tube to Spitalfields Market. Its origins are in the mists of time, but in recent times, i.e. the past few years, it's been moving upscale, with prices to match. Still a good browse. My favourite is a long rack of men's jackets labelled bespoke (North Americans read custom made) but nontheless available off the rack. At another stall some wit has made a sign saying that MPs may put goods on their expense accounts but House of Lords memebers must pay cash.

Then to Covent Garden, which is always fun on weekends. Lots of crafts and a lady singing opera, as well as entertainers such as the man on a tightrope juggling knives. Home by tube. A young Asian man kindly offers me his seat, a courtesy I'm not really accustomed to. Have I begun to look old?

Saturday, March 27/2010

Over to the British Museum for the talk - ancient Egypt and the Island of Cyprus. There are about thirty of us gathered in the Cyprus Gallery. The talk is interesting - before Cyprus was Roman, and long before it was Greek, it was Egyptian, and the museum has a cuneiform tablet recording trade needs. The speaker is informative - about the Egyptian Empire, reaching to the Levant, the Kingdom of Alasiya, centred in the north of Cyprus at Enkomi (near Famagusta), and Cypriot style artefacts found in Egypt and the evidence from shipwrecks, much of this predating the existence of coins.

Trail up Tottenham Court Road looking at the netbooks in the electronics shops. This is where we got J's camera a few years ago. Then up to Camden Town market, which is so busy it's hard to move along the pavement. It starts to rain, so we get on a bus, and off on finchley Road. Look in Waitrose, and hit the mark down moment. So dinner becomes a sweet potato and bean chilli with jalapenos, brown rice and spinach, which proves delicious. the instructions are fun too: "once opened use staight away or we'll come round and get you" and "no vegetables were harmed in the making of this product (apart from a little light chopping)".

Friday, March 26/2010

Over to the British Museum to check out some upcoming talks. Drool in the ikncredibly expensive shops and stop to see an amazing sculpture. It's probably a little less than a foot long and no more than two inches across and is the oldest sculpture known to exist in the world (about 13000 years), a carving of a male reindeer swimming after a female, done with detail out of a mammoth tusk and discovered in france. Astonishing even to think of reindeer and mammoths in France, let alone in this delicate carving.

Then over to the National Theatre to get the schedule. We badly want to see Alan Bennett's new play, The Habit of Art, but a couple of other plays look really good as well, including David Hare's The Power of Yes.

It's sunny and nice, so we stroll along the South Bank to the Tate Modern. We always look forward to the major installations in the great hall and this one doesnt disappoint. It's by Miroslaw Balka, from Poland, and is a huge black container that the viewer walk into, feeling their way in the dark. Sounds a bit simple, and it is, but there are bits of light, or must be, as you can see subtle smoke effects along the floor. And are those the other people we hear or electronically produced sound? It's surprisingly unnerving - although you can turn around at any point and see clearly enough to navigate.

Then up to the fifth floor, where there's lots of interest, incljuding a roomful of Andy Warhol cows and a collection of old Soviet posters, as well as one of the few copies of Rodin's The Kiss cast in the artist's lifetime. I'm taken with a map of the world by an Italian called Boeti. Each country is shown in the colours of (actually fragments of) its flag, but there are curious distortions of size and shape that are hard to understand.

Then along by bus over Blackfriars Bridge and walk along to Chancery Lane tube station, passing Staples Inn on the way, partly restored to its 16th century origins, the face on Holborn St. looking much as it must have in Tudor times. Off the tube for a quick stop in Camden Town and more tiny tomatoes and onions from Inverness St. market. Lucky to nab them as the stalls are packing up. Then home for the pea soup J made yesterday and pitas with pilchards and tomato, onions, cucumber and strained yoghurt.

Thursday, March 25/2010

Down to the Barbican where I catch up on the internet. Discover a ton of hits on Google for "free lectures+London" just before my time is up. Next time.

Thinking of going to Greenwich, but there's a signals failure and Docklands light railway has severe delays, so head back instead.

Wednesday, March 24/2010

Down to our bank - HSBC at charing Cross - to collect our new debit cards, which we've had mailed here rather than home where they would languish until we got back. The waiting area has big screen tv with a news channel, newspapers and real hardcover books. Does anyone ever have to wait that long? Well, not us. They ask for our passports and check my signature, but the cards are here so we can use the account.

Then to Piccadilly to the Visitor Centre to pick up an amazingly heavy lot of brochures covering all the plays, walks, day trips, etc that we can avail ourselves of for the rest of our stay. And to Camden Town where we pick up an umbrell for 99p (at the 99; store) to replace the one left on the bus yesterday, and stop at Inverness St. market for bananas, apples, peppers, onions, broccoli and cucumber - usually both nicer and cheaper at the market than in the supermarket.

Tuesday, March 23/2010

Moving day. We pack up and say our goodbyes - Jasmine joining in the waving. Train to Waterloo and then tube to Belsize Park. Marty is not in the office as her mother has died and she's gone to Spain for a couple of weeks to settle things. But we're remembered and they even let us pay in two lots without taking a deposit.

So we move in and head out for a paper and the basic supplies and settle down. A nice ground floor flat at number 20. No remote for the telly but a huge shower and an ironing board and iron - should it ever come to that.

Monday, Marc h 22/2

Reluctant departure for the drive back. We'd thought of going by Dartmoor, but there's too much mist and some rain so we go the more direct route. Home to thames Ditton by dinner. Spaghetti with Doug and Jenny - greetings from the dogs and to bed.

Sunday, March 21/2010

Relaxed start and then the tour continues. At Carbis Bay we actually see swimmers in the sea, though the winds are pretty chill. A gig lands with its crew of rowers as well, greeted by enthusiastic dogs obviously belonging to the rowers. The term gig apparently dates to the time when these slim boats took pilots out to incoming ships needing local pilots in the harbour, each competing for the job. Same origins as musical gig?

St. Ives itself is bigger than I expected but every bit as charming. Andy settles himself in the sun at a waterfront pub, the Sloop, established, astonishingly, in 1312. The rest of us split up and explore. The church looks interesting (who was St. Ia?) but says iti's open most weekdays. To prevent interference with worship, one supposes. Anyway it's locked now. Lots of shops, galleries and boutiques open though, but with nothing all that underpriced - compared, say, with Mousehole.

Lots of children on the beach, with spades and buckets and happy dogs. We pick up Cornish pasties (Andy, Jenny and me) - that are streets better than Falmouth's - and Cornish homemade ice cream (Joe and Jenny's mum) and sit on a beam on the edge of the beach eating and watching the man who makes traditional lobster pots out of what looks like willow.

Then a visit with Andy's younger daughter, Olivia, in Penzance. She's seventeen and at a sixth form college, sweet and a little shy. She's not sure about next year's courses but is planning a holiday in Spain in august with her friends. finish up with a drive along the huge Hayle tidal estuary and a view out over the high cliffs to seven miles of unbroken, and almost unpeopled, white sands. So home with visions of rugged cliffs, fine sandy coves, elaborate victorian holiday hotels, and harbour beakwaters in our heads.

Andy makes us dinner - a lovely stirfry with shrimp and a very nice bottle of red wine - whose name I promptly forget. His shelves are lined with fascinating books but it proves impossible to stay awake long enough to read much. I do threaten not to re-emerge from the upstairs loo while reading Steven Pinker's The Stuff of Thought, though.

Saturday, March 20/2010

We drive cross-country - well, really cross peninsula tip - to Jenny's brother Andy, who lives in the country near Hayle, actually walking distance from St. Ives, across the fields. More flowers out here than further north, including fields of daffodils grown commercially. Andy lives on a narrow country road in the end cottage of a row of old stone miners' cottages. His place is wonderful - originally it was two units, each wih a single large room downstairs and the same up. This has become a large kitchen, living room and study downstairs and three bedrooms upstairs with added bathrooms. It's a beautiful combination of original features - the thick stone walls and fireplaces - and modern touches like the bathroom skylight.

Andy is welcoming, with coffee around the long wooden table and J, looking around at the hob in the original fireplace with its massive single stone top and out the deep stone window to the heather and the birdfeeders, warms him we may never leave. And then we get the grand tour, as Andy drives us all over he ti end of Cornwall. Starts with St. Michael's Mount, impressive mansion topped island - at high tide - accessible by causeway at low. Through Penzance and along the coast to Mousehole (pronounced Mousel).

Hard competition for the most stunning spot of the day, but Lamorna Cove is a strong contender. Through narrow, twisting lanes (back up if you meet another car) to a little coastal cove surrounded by rugged cliffs, with huge waves crashing against the rocks. There's a massive breakwater and Jenny points to a sign on it warning of uneven steps - eroded into non-existence would be more like it. There's a little restaurant as well, with a pretty impressive local menu. Jenny's mum and Joe and I have crab sandwiches with salad while Jenny has a smoked haddock pasty and Andy seafood soup. The crab sandwich is the best we've had - enormous and thick with fresh sweet crab on granary bread and a plateful of salad.

Then to Minack Point, home of a theatre, where we look down on an amazing cove - whilst nearly being blown off the cliff. Through Zennor, where there's an old stone with a hollow where, the sign says, there was a vinegar dip in times of plague and coins from outside the community were dipped to disinfect them before being taken by a local. A quick look at St. Ives, promised for tomorrow, and home. Andy's booked us at his local for seven.

Andy's loca, the Engine Inn at Cripplesease, is a bit of local history itself. Cornwall is tin mining country and the stack remains of the engines are scattered through the country like small ruins. The Engine Inn was the counting house where miners were paid. Lovely stone building - with good Cornish bitter and nice meals - mine a roast vegetable quiche with a lovely salad. The treat of the evening is readings from the poetry of a now deceased local (well, not local as Cornishmen reckon it as he moved here as an adult), Arthur Caddick. His daughter and others reminisce and read from his poems, some of which are quite funny.

Friday, March 19/2010

Our last day in Falmouth, though already we can imagine staying forever. We separate after breakfast again and Joe and I start off in the direction of the castle. Styop to buy an umbrella - two pounds something - at Trago, a fascinating overgrown general store with everything from shortbread to solid oak tables (£90!! but too heavy to lift, let alone bring home). J's old umbrella has broken and it's starting to rain. We get a little farther this time, but the rain gets heavier and the wind picks up, so we abandon the castle and go for ta at the little aquatic centre - not much to look at on the outside but a pleasant club inside and situated in a boatyard, so interesting views out the windowed front. Interesting Cornwall newspaper as well, with surprisingly good prices on used boats - and some laying hens and cockerels free, or nearly so. Jenny and her mum, meanwhile, have beaten the rain by hopping on a bus to Truro and visiting the cathedral there.

Mystery drive south of Falmouth, past the castle and a Victorian hotel and along the coast, getting happily lost on narrow roads. The signposts seem always to tell us that Gweek is four miles away no matter which way we turn. Then pick up fish and chips for supper. Haddock and mushy peas. Seems to go well with our harbour front home.

Thursday, March 18/2010

We have to tear ourselves away from the hypnotic window over the harbour to see the rest of the town. We separate, with Jenny and her mum heading off to see Pendennis Castle, built by Henry VIII as part of a line of southern defense against the Spanish, while Joe and I explore the little shops and lanes in the old town. There aren't many tourists about, so we get a fair view of the place as it is, busy and friendly and full of little shops with Cornish pasties or fis and chips, clothing shops, antique shops, bakeries, tearooms and pubs. We pick up a chicken and some salad and wine for dinner, leave it at the flat and head out toward the castle. But by this time it's raining, so we stop at the intriguingly named Oggy Oggy for Cornish pasties. I have a cheese and mushroom one and J the traditional steak, potato and veg. He's not overly impressed, in part because I described it in advance as somewhat similar to a meat pie, instead of as a substitute for a sandwich and he can see how much more he'd like it with gravy. Yes, he knows that miners used to take the pasties as a lunch, complete in one pastry, but couldn't they have let it evolve later? Would like to stop at the church, King Charles the Martyr (this was a royalist stronghold in the civil war), which is nestled in the crook of the street, but it's locked.

Meet back at the flat with Jenny and her mother, who have walked out to Pendennis Castle, passing little wild violets on the way, having had an earlier start in that direction than we did, and taken a taxi back once it got wetter. So more time in front of the magical window, and J roasts the chicken for dinner.

Wednesday, March 17/2010

We're off on our west country trip, stopping in Wimbledon to collect Jenny's mum. It takes a while to clear the city but we're out through Hampton Court and into rural Surrey, then Wiltshire. Stop briefly at Stonehenge. We don't take the time for the tour - Cornwall is a long way away - but get a pretty good look across the field. In fact its location in the midst of farmland is one of the most striking things about it. Though it's probable that the fields were woodland in the distant past - or would that have made importing the giant rocks not just amazing but impossible? Stop at a petrol station to pick up a little for lunch. Canadian highway stations come off very badly by comparison. The convenience shop here includes chicken Kiev and chardonnay, though we settle for bread and cheese and yoghurt.

Through fields and along Bodmin Moor, we avoid the motorways when possible and head down from Truro to Falmouth on the south coast of Cornwall. The directions break down a bit as there are road repairs in the town but a young woman gives Jenny extremely good, if complicated, alternate directions, which Jenny, impressively, remembers. So down the old cobbled high street and through an almost impossibly narrow lane, Old Church Yard, possible only with the outside driving mirrors retracted, and we're there.

The flat belongs to friends of Jenny's, originally the home of Jenny's friend Jessica, who now uses it for holidays and also lets it. And it's absolutely brilliant - would be the envy of anyone looking for a coastal film set. It's in the oldest part of the town, set on a harbour that has been a centre of ship repairs, fishing and travel for centuries. There is a flat below (currently being renovated) and one above, but they're all nestled into the rock of the embankment so that the one below is invisible and the top two look like separate little cottages. It's lovely inside as well - particularly the living room which has a large floor to ceiling window in front, incorporating French doors to a little balcony overhanging the harbour.

The harbour is quiet but alive, with dozens of sailboats, loading quays, freighters, and even a large military ship of some sort in battleship grey. It's equally fascinating in daylight, with the circling gulls and activity on the boats, and after nightfall when the shipboard lights come on.

A short exploratory walk along the harbour and its shops. We pass a restaurant where celebrity cook Rick Stein has a new fish and chip shop opening Friday - it's full today with "practice" customers eating and workmen finishing off the paint. No more volunteers needed, so we go home and Jenny makes an omelet and vegetables and we all turn in.

Tuesday, March 16/2010

Wake to sun and silence. It's so quiet in Thames Ditton after the traffic of central Larnaca. You can lie in bed in the morning and listen to the birds sing.

Jenny is looking after Jasmine (14 months) for the day while Emma is at work and Doug and Giles off working on an electrical job of Giles's. Jasmine is lovely - round-faced, big-eyed and usually happy, though today she has a cold and is a little clingy. Still up for a joke, though, and thinks it pretty funny when she coughs and Joe says ah-choo. She's beginning to talk and knows quite a few words as well as some that she can sign, like bird. We take a morning walk round Thames Ditton admiring the flowers and, in the afternoon take Jasmine round Kingston in her pushchair as Jenny is visiting the dentist. She's quite happy to come with us and interested in everything. Later Jenny and I go round to the hall where Sam and Kai are being inducted into scouts. Laura and Nathan are there with Cody, who's the same age as Jasmine. When Sam and Kai put one hand on the flag and raise the other, Cody is quite interested and puts his hand in the air as well.

Monday, March 15/2010

Last day, so we're up early. I to the hairdresser to get a cut to last until we get home. As usual, we have too much food left, but that does allow for good sandwiches at the airport. The bus goes at 12:30 to the new airport - larger than the old but without the nice open air deck where we used to picnic. Do find enough seating for our roast chicken and artichoke sandwiches though.

Thanks probably to the looming strike, the plane is only half full and very relaxed. Everyone who wants two seats has them. A very nice chicken curry for dinner with a fairly good Bordeaux. The little dishes seem too good to be throwaways so I inquire (thinking that the bedsit is sometimes underequipped) and the stewardess insists that I keep two - and in fact returns with some disposable cups and again later with two small brandies in case the beds should prove hard in the bedsit.

London's lights are warm and the bridges sparkle. We land at Terminal 5 and Jenny comes to meet us. As we feared, access to T5 is chaotic and not well signed but Jenny is cheerful and gracious about it - she's now had experience with Terminal 5 so next time she'll know. And home to Doug and the dogs - who seem to remember us (the dogs, that is, Doug clearly does).

Sunday, March 14/2010

The suitcases don't hold much but take longer to pack for that as it's like a Chinese puzzle. Pause for brunch and then later a true break as we head over to the little sports bar to watch the opening race of the 2010 Formula One season. We'd checked earlier and the bartender had been helpful - but the timing was the same as a Rangers vs Dundee football match as well as a rugby match - would we mind watching on the little screen in the corner? No, we'd be delighted to watch at all. But when we arrive we find that almost everyone is here for the race - both big screens - with a couple of people seated at the bar following the rugby. Nice atmosphere and a pint of Guinness each. Sort of half way between watching at home and being at the race track. Clearer commentary and easier to identify the cars at home while the racetrack has the noise and excitement. Not a wildly exciting race though. New rules and cars finishing in more or less the order they started in. And the Bahrain track suffers from monochrome desert colouring.

Then over to the internet cafe across the back lane to choose the seats for tomorrow's flight. A half dozen computers with sticky keys (well mine, anyway) and full of young male foreign students. The one next to me is Romanian and he spends his hour chatting with a pretty girl (she fills the screen). I'd rather not be listening as it's a bit distracting but it's hard not to hear: No, don't take off your shirt - there are other people here, know what I mean.

M&M drop in for a last goodbye and the last of the g&t and artichokes, Magne so tired after a long day out that he falls asleep in his chair.

Saturday, March 13/2010

Moving day. And the last minute nearly forgots as we note that the drying rack is still on the balcony and J threads an old t-shirt through the handle holes in an already sealed box. It looks too much, but everything packs into M's little hired car - except J himself, who walks the short distance. No lift to the mezzanine at the Sunflower but we get it safely stowed away.



Then off to Agia Napa - or rather the hills above it - to a little chapel accessible by dirt track. The Greek name translates as "St. Forty" - and we joke about Ali Baba and the forty thieves, as the chapel is actually a large cave that has had a whitewashed cement wall built across the front - blue wooden door inserted. Inside there is the usual icon and oil lamp - clearly a holy place for genertions, probably centuries. There is a visitors' book, hard covered with damp - soft pages drifting loose. It's been taking entries since 2002 and we're now on the last page. As that's pretty full, I turn to look at the inside cover, which turns out to be a double page schematic of the London Underground system, routes in full colour.



We sit outside for a while, eating crisps and sharing beer and looking over the fields to a haze covered sea. Maggi's been photographing the flowers on our walk along the path - stunning little purple flowers like miniature violets, poppy-like white ones, silvery stars, yellow daisies and golden mimosa bushes in full flower as far as the eye can see. Others we're not even sure of. Orchids? There are a lot in Cyprus, which has its own little ecology due to having escaped the ravages of the ice age but received deposits from glaciers moving south.

As we sit, other visitors come and go. A Greek man shows us the contents of his plastic bag. He's been picking something in the fields, and we suppose snails, as we've spotted some ourselves, but he shows us a green spiky thing about two inches in diameter. Yes, it's to eat - and a few minutes later a aboy comes back to us with something cut in pea sized pieces, and tasting somewhat like raw peas. So a wild artichoke of some sort. Not bad, but probably better sauteed.



Then a German couple arrive with backpacks and hiking boots. Not young but quite fit. They've been walking cross-country and Maggi points them on to St. Elias chapel, also on a hill. From there they'll be able to get a bus home. And we ourselves wander back to the car and drive on back, stopping at Agia Napa harbour - now beginning to bloom with tourists - for a sandwich and a beer. Lovely day - warm but not too hot. Agia Napa is more touristy than Larnaca, but it's also closer to the lovely hills and fields of rural Cyprus.

Friday, March 12/2010

British Airways cabin crew union announces strike dates but they begin five days after we fly. By bedtime we have everything packed - wrapped, boxed, taped and tied, except for the microwave and the drying rack for the clothes - the latter inherited at some point along the way. Actually most of the useful bits and pieces were inherited or from charity shops but they're all things that come in handy - like the soup pot or the serrated knife and the radio. It's rather an editorial "we" - the we that have finished packing. I've helped line things up but J has done all the slotting in as well as sealing all with hockey tape and tying up with cord.

Thursday, March 11/2010

The juggling begins. Maggi has kindly offered to drive our boxes over to the Sunflower on Saturday morning. this is actually two days before we leave, so we have to make decisions now before we're quite finished about what to store, what to take with us and what to discard.

Wednesday, March 10/2010

The body of former Cypriot president Tassos Papadopoulis has been discovered covered with a thin layer of earth in a grave (already occupied as nearly as one can make out - where are the lurid tabloids when a story cries out for gory details?) in a Nicosia cemetery other than the one from which it disappeared. And arrests have been made of two cypriots (well, one was already in jail, for murder no less - the infamous "Al Capone of previous police humiliation) and a man of Indian nationality. It appears the Indian was paid only €200, much less than he says he was promised, to go back to India and start a new life. He'll undoubtedly be deported to India after prison (I'm inappropriately presuming conviction) but the new life he'd wanted won't be quite the same.



A warm day. The western end of the Mediterranean is still subject to snowstorms - in Spain and the south of France - but the eastern end has been unseasonably warm, with temperatures in Tel Aviv over 30 and ours reliably in the 20's, in part thanks to a blanketing of Saharan dust.



We're definitely in the clear now with regard to the flight on Monday. British Airways are still negotiating with the union representing cabin crew, but regardless of the outcome they can't strike before our flight as they must give seven days notice. So Monday night will see us in London. Jenny says she was at Hampton Court on the weekend and the crocuses are up but the daffodils are late this year.

Tuesday, March 9/2010

Walk out to M&M's for a curry lunch. We stop on the way at the flamingo Hotel exhibit, still taken with the batik of Lefkara but unhappy about its ill-fitted framing. Have a chat with Paulina, the young Bulgarian receptionist. Would the artist consider selling it unframed for less. She promises to try to find out.

Lovely chicken curry - mouthwatering smells from the time we enter the lift. And we're all a little sad that our time in Cyprus seems to be coming so rapidly to an end.

Monday, March 8/2010

J has a large bag of artichokes from Saturday's market (€1.70 for the bag - £1.53 GBP or $2.40 CAD). They're quite a bit of work as he peels down to the hearts, but incredibly good. Much too good not to share, so M&M stop to have an early lunch with the sliced hearts sautéed and other nibbles. Minus tablecloth as we've begun packing things away for the season.

There's an exhibition opening at the gallery on Stadiou, so we go. Turns out to be paintings by a man called rinos Stefani. We try to be appreciative but fail. It's not simply that the pictures are ugly - there's no reason that art shouldn't be ugly - it's that try as we might we can't spot any signs of talent. J points out that a high proportion of the paintings are dated 2009, and it's hard not to think that none of them has taken very long to produce - childish, charmless and devoid of impact. We've circled the gallery twice when it's time for the speeches to start and we decide that's our cue to leave. No real point in waiting for the wine and nuts. Lovely warm night for the walk back though.

Sunday, March 7/2010

Go to Mass and discover that Fr. Wilhelm has gone oon rest and renewal leave and been replaced by Fr. Andrew, a Canadian Franciscan of Filipino origin. This is his first parish, but he seems like a good choice, given the large number of Filipina workers in the parish. The public address system is not the clearest, so most of the specific wording of his first sermon misses us, but it seems that he has used up enough material for his first three homilies in one go.

In the afternoon Maggi cycles over and we play Scrabble.

Saturday, March 6/2010

Jane and Bill Curtis at coffee place as well as Maggi, so we thing of Jane's "coffee spot" painting.

One of the commentators on Gordon Brown's testimony before the Chilcot committee of inquiry yesterday: like a group of guinea pigs trying to tackle a brown bear. And, further on the prime ministerial theme, Stephen Harper makes the BBC news - unusual for any Canadian non-sports story. So we're informed that there was a suggestion that the words to "O Canada" be revised and I think that this could be a good thing, as the French words are brilliant but the English are pretty uninspired, not to say mindlessly repetitive. Turns out that's not it though. Harper has suggested that "all thy sons" might be replaced by something gender neutral - and been booed back into 24 Sussex.

Friday, March 4/2010

London's temperature hits double digits so there's some hope at the end of their worst winter in 30 years. And not a moment too soon, as we're to fly back there in ten days. Fingers still crosse that the threatened cabin crew strike at British Airways won't intervene. They have to give seven days notice, so if we make it through to Monday evening without strike notice we're in the clear. Actually there would be no difficulty about staying on here, probably in the same flat, and we're not booked in the bedsit util the 23rd. What's at risk is our much anticipated trip to Cornwall with Jenny and her mum.

Watch Gordon Brown testifying before the Chilcot inquiry into the invasion of Iraq, carried live by BBC World television. While in theory Brown's testimony ought to be as interesting as Blair's, this doesn't prove to be the case. Of course Blair testified on what ws a rainy day in Cyprus, whilst today is sunny, so there were fewer alternatives to viewing, but it's more than that. There's no performance art about Brown's delivery - just a bull ahead monotoone for hours, the gist of which is that the invasion was the right thing to do and the army was always as well funded as they wished to be during the invasion and occupation. The two positions are probably equally subject to dispute and equally lacking in humility, but with Tony the fascination (and much of the annoyance) was always in the dance, which earned a certain admiration despite any disapproval.

J, coming back from the bakery, squeezes his way past a parked car and finds himself facing the back seat, where a woman wearing a hijab is uncovered to breast feed her baby. J says her mouth opened in shock - and she instinctively covered her face.

Thursday, March 4/2010

We find Maggi's little old lady (probably no older than we are) who does dressmaking and repairs in a little shop near the market and she agrees to turn the collars on three of J's Tilley's shirts for €5 apiece, giving them a new lease on life. Ready tomorrow.

Wednesday, March 3/2010

We have new neighbours in the building opposite, seen only, of course, when they are out on the balcony. The previous tenants had two cute little girls who appeared on weekends, sometimes permitted to use the laptop, which spent most of its time outside next to the ashtray. The new people have no children in evidence and fill the balcony with amazing amounts of wash. So far I haven't subscribed to J's suggestion that the woman takes in laundry, largely because I can't imagine there being any profit in it in modern times, but I'm beginning to think he may be right. It's hard to imagine how one small household could generate three or four lines of wash a day, day after day.

We walk out to M&M's in the afternoon. It's windy, but a warm wind and a lovely walk along the seafront. The waves are high enough that we get a little of the splash. There are plans for a new walkway out along Makenzy (spelling correct by local custom) and it will certainly make life safer for pedestrians, as for most of the way there is no sidewalk and walkers are caught between speeding cars and the crumbling edge of the roadway. Lovely and sunny on their balcony drinking g&t and looking at the shifting colours of the sea.

Then with Maggi over to the Flamingo Hotel, which is displaying the work of local artists, including Jane Curtis, whom we saw at Saturday's coffee. She has a number of paintings on the Cypriot theme, including a small water colour of a coffee spot in a typical Cypriot village which we all like . there is also a batik artist, identified only as Breda, with intriguing pictures, J's favourite being one called Lefkara.

Jacob Zuma, South African president, is visiting the UK, staying at Buckingham Palace with the newest of his three wives - leaving one to wonder what the facilities are at the palace for accommodating heads of state choosing to travel with more than one wife.

Tuesday, March 2/2010

M&M arrive unexpectedly mid-morning, having just delivered back their hired car after 3 months of freedom and mobility. So tea and biscuits and chat. They're not here much longer than we are - another week.

Lovely weather - sunny and warm with light breeze. Always the nicest weather is just as we're about to leave, though of course the better way to look at it is that we miss the nastiest weather elsewhere. J says many more tourists down at the waterfront cafes now that the spring weather is here. And the flowers are looking somewhat refreshed, though there have been beds of petunias, snapdragons and marigolds all winter.

Monday, March 2/2010

J home with bags of grapefruit and oranges, the oranges with dark green leaves still attached, so we can sit in the flat and inhale citrus. It's spoiled us for oranges in England and Canada - they're so disappointing by comparison.

The storm that devastated Madeira has moved northeast through Portugal and Spain and into France, with heavy rains, coastal flooding, and winds as high as 175 km an hour. At least 45 people died in France, and the newscaster refers to them as having, in the majority of cases, drowned in their sleep. A chilling image, but the reality must have been so much more horrific.

Sunday, February 28/2010

Wake briefly in the early hours to an horrific storm. Can't tell whether we're hearing hail or heavy rain, but the winds are violent and the lightning non-stop. Still wet and windy in the morning, so out to the nearest bakery for a loaf of round village bread, sprinkled with sesame seeds and still hot, and back with the bread and the Sunday paper.

Saturday, February 27/2010

Jimmy's Café for morning coffee/beer. M&M are there as well as Jane and Bill Curtis, a retired English couple who live in Pyla in the winter and on their boat in the summer. Lovely letting the sun sink in. M&M back later for tea and the second half of J's cake. by two the dark clouds are moving in from the north and later the rain starts.

We watch a BBC documentary on a re-emergent Stalinism in Russia and Georgia. New school textbooks ignore stalin's crimes and vastly underestimate the number of his victims in the interests of inculcating "positive history." And many citizens are happy to rethink the past in order to have heroes to admire rather than villains to regret. Thus the past is rewritten in accordance with a Russian saying that goes "You never know what is going to happen yesterday." And we remember driving across Moscow in 1991, three weeks before the coup attempt, and seeing an enormous bust of Lenin being carted away in the back of a truck.

Dubai news reports items seized by customs, including drugs and "materials used in witchcraft."

Friday, February 26/2010

Starts out a cool but dry day, long enough for J to get in his exercise at the beach and for us to head over to the student centre for the internet and a look at the Friday paper. While we're at the student centre - umbrellaless - the rain starts, and the rest of the day is nasty, wet and very windy. A good day to hunker down with soup and television documentaries and reading. Now alternating our last two books, Gabriel Garcia Marquez's One Hundred Years of Solitude and Robertson Davies' Fifth Business. Happily, we're across the road from a little charity shop, so it's impossible to run out of books entirely - but that road quickly becomes three inches deep in water during heavy rains. Suitable only for waterproof boots.

Fall asleep watching the late night film on the swedish chanel - the original Little Lord Fauntleroy with Mickey Rooney - subtitled in Swedish.