We to coffee with M, who has cycled in from her new flat and is making a morning of it. No isolation for her - coffee first with the Norwegians at George's café, then with us at Jimmy`s, and finally with her friend Dino at the market, spaced at one hour intervals. Actually it`s been hot enough walking over in the sun that J and I forgo the Cypriot coffee and split a large beer, which is actually quite large enough for two, and the salted peanuts are a bonus.
J comments on the number of rich youngish to middle aged men who seem to have little to do but drink coffee at the more expensive cafés, with their Mercedes or luxury sports cars parked - legally or otherwise - nearby. There is a very high youth unemployment rate here, but these are not its representatives. Nor are they the equivalent to our regular friends at the coffee spot in Sioux Lookout, where only the retired spend all morning and no one is drinking lattes. Our counterpart is to be found in the smaller backstreet cafés and sometimes in the parking lots, where one old man may be occasionally stirring himself to take money from a customer and two or three of his cronies join him in the sun with cups of coffee (cups to be returned to the nearest café later) and a backgammon board. A pleasant, slow-paced life for the retired, though as J points out it`s a man`s world. Older Cypriot women are almost never seen at cafés, though female expats and tourists frequent them and young local women often go to the higher status coffee places.
J comments on the number of rich youngish to middle aged men who seem to have little to do but drink coffee at the more expensive cafés, with their Mercedes or luxury sports cars parked - legally or otherwise - nearby. There is a very high youth unemployment rate here, but these are not its representatives. Nor are they the equivalent to our regular friends at the coffee spot in Sioux Lookout, where only the retired spend all morning and no one is drinking lattes. Our counterpart is to be found in the smaller backstreet cafés and sometimes in the parking lots, where one old man may be occasionally stirring himself to take money from a customer and two or three of his cronies join him in the sun with cups of coffee (cups to be returned to the nearest café later) and a backgammon board. A pleasant, slow-paced life for the retired, though as J points out it`s a man`s world. Older Cypriot women are almost never seen at cafés, though female expats and tourists frequent them and young local women often go to the higher status coffee places.