Last day in our home for the last four months and a bit. We’ll miss it. The neighbourhood - and the neighbours - the village feeling, the compelling ruins, the corner shop, the restaurant round the corner, the watermelon truck. Are looking forward to the new place, though, even knowing it will be for a shorter time. Apart from its being right next to the weekly market, it’s in a different Famagusta. Not the old walled town but the modern city, where most Famagustans actually live. Some 55000+ inhabitants, although published numbers always lag behind the reality.
Can’t remember when it last rained. Weeks (months?) ago, so it’s dry. Cyprus as a whole is at risk of becoming a desert island (not deserted, just desert) down to decreasing rainfall, increasing urbanisation and increasing water consumption. In the North there has been an underwater pipeline from Turkey but it’s now in need of repairs so there are shortages. Not especially here, but people near Kyrenia are reporting having water only three days a week, and some of them say it’s normal at this time of year. Someone posted a photo of the reservoir in the west of the country, which prompted me to look for one I took in December 2017. Only an extremely wide angle lens would encompass the whole reservoir, but the difference is clear.
We have been careful. Used water from hand washed clothes on plants, etc. Aware that we might not notice warnings in the Turkish press. For what it’s worth the man across the road is still washing his car.
Aysel had talked of our going out for a traditional Cypriot meal. She has a friend with a taverna who had said on a Monday or Tuesday he could seat us well away from others. And would presumably be outside - no one here wants to be inside on summer evenings. But she is round, apologetically, to say that she had heard of a restaurant singer who had tested positive and now was afraid to go out. Told her she was quite right not to. Don’t know if the story was right. Actually sounds not. There are now nine cases in the country and think they all came from abroad as the country opened for tourists. No one is supposed to get in without tests before leaving and after arriving. Some with additional quarantine after that. But there are bound to be some glitches. Aysel has had a bone marrow transplant and shouldn’t really be with unmasked people including us - and of course we would be if we were eating. All for the best anyway. We have packing to do and her partner doesn’t speak English so would have been a dull evening for him apart from the food. Nice thought on Aysel’s part though.
There’s an excellent bakery cum restaurant and confectioners in the old city and we have bought an extremely classy looking box of chocolates for the lovely grandmother across the road who has been bringing us baking and flowers. When she comes with our jasmine circlet of the day J gets the box and I press most of my Turkish vocabulary into service. Yarın (tomorrow) and wave goodbye. She points to the sky, simulating airplane flight. So the rest of my vocabulary is employed. Kıbrıs bir hafta (Cyprus one week). Then add Ercan (Nicosia airport), Istanbul, London, Canada. Which may well not be the route, or for that matter rhe time remaining in Cyprus, but she gets the idea.
The grandmother returns later with a small delegation of the people from across, all of whom we imagine are related. The man who owns the dogs speaks quite good English - and indeed, it turns out has an uncle in Kitchener - and so they get the story of how we came to be here. Give them our dentist’s name and two of the women nod. Famagusta is not a tiny city, but the old town is a very small world and Fehmi had said that he had had family connections on this road. And if we thought it was possible to give the last gift when exchanging with the grandmother, we were wrong. She’s brought a Cyprus delicacy: two jars of preserved fruit, one watermelon and one labelled bergamut. The latter presumably the bergamot oranges that Kiki used to give us in Larnaca, the ones I used to make marmalade - delicious but labour intensive using only a penknife. A small and lovely world. We will miss it.
Can’t remember when it last rained. Weeks (months?) ago, so it’s dry. Cyprus as a whole is at risk of becoming a desert island (not deserted, just desert) down to decreasing rainfall, increasing urbanisation and increasing water consumption. In the North there has been an underwater pipeline from Turkey but it’s now in need of repairs so there are shortages. Not especially here, but people near Kyrenia are reporting having water only three days a week, and some of them say it’s normal at this time of year. Someone posted a photo of the reservoir in the west of the country, which prompted me to look for one I took in December 2017. Only an extremely wide angle lens would encompass the whole reservoir, but the difference is clear.
We have been careful. Used water from hand washed clothes on plants, etc. Aware that we might not notice warnings in the Turkish press. For what it’s worth the man across the road is still washing his car.
Aysel had talked of our going out for a traditional Cypriot meal. She has a friend with a taverna who had said on a Monday or Tuesday he could seat us well away from others. And would presumably be outside - no one here wants to be inside on summer evenings. But she is round, apologetically, to say that she had heard of a restaurant singer who had tested positive and now was afraid to go out. Told her she was quite right not to. Don’t know if the story was right. Actually sounds not. There are now nine cases in the country and think they all came from abroad as the country opened for tourists. No one is supposed to get in without tests before leaving and after arriving. Some with additional quarantine after that. But there are bound to be some glitches. Aysel has had a bone marrow transplant and shouldn’t really be with unmasked people including us - and of course we would be if we were eating. All for the best anyway. We have packing to do and her partner doesn’t speak English so would have been a dull evening for him apart from the food. Nice thought on Aysel’s part though.
There’s an excellent bakery cum restaurant and confectioners in the old city and we have bought an extremely classy looking box of chocolates for the lovely grandmother across the road who has been bringing us baking and flowers. When she comes with our jasmine circlet of the day J gets the box and I press most of my Turkish vocabulary into service. Yarın (tomorrow) and wave goodbye. She points to the sky, simulating airplane flight. So the rest of my vocabulary is employed. Kıbrıs bir hafta (Cyprus one week). Then add Ercan (Nicosia airport), Istanbul, London, Canada. Which may well not be the route, or for that matter rhe time remaining in Cyprus, but she gets the idea.
The grandmother returns later with a small delegation of the people from across, all of whom we imagine are related. The man who owns the dogs speaks quite good English - and indeed, it turns out has an uncle in Kitchener - and so they get the story of how we came to be here. Give them our dentist’s name and two of the women nod. Famagusta is not a tiny city, but the old town is a very small world and Fehmi had said that he had had family connections on this road. And if we thought it was possible to give the last gift when exchanging with the grandmother, we were wrong. She’s brought a Cyprus delicacy: two jars of preserved fruit, one watermelon and one labelled bergamut. The latter presumably the bergamot oranges that Kiki used to give us in Larnaca, the ones I used to make marmalade - delicious but labour intensive using only a penknife. A small and lovely world. We will miss it.