Sunday, August 9/2020

Last entry of the travel season. 

Tube to Heathrow. Again, one stop and nearly empty carriages, so probably pretty well as safe as any transport and everybody masked. Only real bottleneck just outside Terminal 2. Appears to be a matter of staff trying to prevent too many people congregating inside with resultant difficulties in social distancing. So we’re asked what time our flight is and let in if it’s within two hours or so. Meanwhile the growing numbers between the entry lift and the doors has little hope of two metres distance. We’re lucky in the timing, though, and go straight in. 

Heathrow pretty unbusy. No difficulty at all finding seats and a lot of shops closed. Duty Free doing business again, with one way traffic and reminders not to touch what you’re not about to buy. Specials less special than they once were, as well as less variety - and none of the distillers’ reps with chat and taster’s samples. 

Air Canada flight to Montreal a quarter full, if that. Really pleasant, apart from a group of half a dozen girls who are mask averse, reminded to leave them on covering both mouth and nose repeatedly until there are warnings that they could be turned over to authorities and fined. Then super quiet. Meal vegetarian, and cold, but surprisingly good. Montreal airport quiet and very efficient. Flight to Winnipeg very full, though, presumably down to there being many fewer flights going. People pretty good though. 

Suitcases checked in London arrive in Winnipeg as promised. Realise that I’m increasingly like Piaget’s baby - when the cases disappear at check in I do more than prudently carry valuables In my cabin baggage. They cease to exist for me. I lose any real expectation of ever seeIng them again. So always happy to see them on the carousel even if that is what normally happens.

Hotel, happily, about six steps from the airport and travels over - for now.

Saturday, August 8/2020

Last day of our pandemic adventure. Well, not necessarily. If this has taught us anything it’s to avoid the sin of presumption. We went to Famagusta for two weeks. That was five months ago come Monday. Tomorrow we’re booked to Winnipeg via Montreal. Quarantine form filled out and submitted. Only the unexpected left to expect. The glitches are never the ones you prepared for.

Friday, August 7/2020

Apart from convenience for Heathrow there are other good things about our location. A pub more or less round the corner. Does have outside tables but we appear to have brought Cypriot weather with us. Full sun and heading for 35. So outside tables somewhat less attractive than they might have been, before evening at least. Also a vegetarian take away with pizza and wraps. And a Tesco superstore about a kilometre away. 

Try to arrange outdoor socially distanced meet up with Jenny but proves too complicated. Jenny’s schedule naturally fuller than ours but most problems covid related. Need a place with outside seating. Also nearby parking (for Jenny). Don’t want public transport to get there (for us). In the end we give up and settle for phone chat.

Small fridge in the room so we go to Tesco for a little food. Seems to be a fair escalation in prices in the past year. Expect the shock effect of fruit and veg prices after five months in Cyprus but quite a lot of items that are marked 50% off seem to be the amount they used to be when they were full price. Interestingly there are a number of signs along the shelves that proclaim a price has been matched with Aldi. Aldi and Lidl have done wonders for UK supermarket competition.

Go to top up the iphone with a voucher from WH Smith. No mobile reception on either mobile in the room. Try the hallway, where it is adequate. So down to the front desk to explain the problem and accept the offer of a different room. Room #2 a weirdly precise copy of room #1 right down to the Welcome Jaworski on the flat screen of the tv. Almost feels like an old episode of The Prisoner. Difference is that this room has a window opening to the outside world and not the inner courtyard.

The difference has a benefit other than mobile reception. We’re on the flight path for Heathrow. Must be great insulation, though. No sound at all gets through but we do get to watch planes coming past the window, looking enormous and landing gear down. J points out that they’re obviously higher than our third storey room as we are looking up - slightly - to see them, but it hardly feels like it. And their silence makes it weirder. 

Grateful for the air conditioning as actual temperature high exceeds forecaster’s promises/threats. London final highest 37 - at Heathrow. Hottest day in 17 years.

Thursday, August 6/2020

The new Istanbul Airport is the largest in the world. Impressive and very new. Though largest in the world has a few drawbacks, mostly in terms of walking distance. Signs not bad. Seating pretty limited in central areas but plenty of it on the peripheries. Many shops and cafés not open yet but enough are. Need a fair bit of transit time just to cover the distance and get in the security checks. Our eight hours and fifteen minutes surplus to requirements, however. 

Quite a few of the seats are labelled with requests that you not sit on them in the interests of social distancing. Some people do, unsurprisingly, and actually it’s complicated. Families should be sitting together. Everyone meant to be masked and pretty well everyone is. Health Security people on scooters as well as on foot circulating constantly and politely but firmly speaking to anyone not properly masked, as well as cheerfully answering questions. Find seats together and doze off a little. Free wifi is free but amounts to an hour, so email checked. And tablet has downloaded books.

Loos interesting. Clean, and it appears that every fourth cubicle has a squat toilet, sign on the cubicle door identifying it as such. Well Istanbul does symbolise the meeting of east and west. And the sign above the sinks says that they are not suitable for Masjid (ritual Muslim) ablutions. Plenty of info signs on the inside of the toilet seat lid on the regular toilets. Although focusing on them would require a face closer to the, admittedly clean, facility than I’m eager to do. Do take its picture though in the interests of later deciphering meaning. Think I should now run a contest for the most creative guess.

Flight to London also Turkish Airlines but much nicer than flight to Istanbul. Larger plane, not too many people. Rows not full and stewardesses more professionally in control. Reasonably decent paper bag lunch (passengers asked to have only one person in their row unmasked to eat at a time). Are given sealed package wIth extra mask, disinfectant wipes, and a small bottle of what purports to be gel hand cleaner but is clearly ungelled alcohol cleaner. Has Turkish Airlines been refilling the bottles? 

Heathrow emptier than we’ve ever seen it. Which results in pretty fast transit. Chipped passports and their owners go through a scan and photograph process and we already provided all the contact and trace landing info electronically to the UK government before we were allowed to board in Nicosia. 

Tube pretty empty, happily. As in airport, people are required to be masked. And we’re only one stop away, so no one can get on and join us in the empty end of the carriage. Hotel a block away from tube station. Room good - and bed comfortable, not that it would probably matter at this point.

Wednesday, August 5/2020

Last day, strangely enough. Booked a flight with Turkish Airways, which of necessity involves a transfer in Turkey. More or less because TRNC is not recognised by any country except Turkey, but it’s actually more complicated than that. Taiwan is recognised by very few countries but has direct flights to other countries. The short explanation, for those disinclined to read the Chicago Convention and associated commentary, is that China tacitly approves - or at least does not try to prevent - flights to Taiwan. It appears that the Chinese are easier to reach agreement with than the Greek Cypriots. Who would have thought?

So our original booking had a transfer in Istanbul to a Turkish Airlines flight to London. It left Ercan Airport in Nicosia at 9:15. And not too much later we got an email telling us of a schedule change. Flight now leaving Ercan at 4:00 AM. Transfer wait time now much longer. Tiny print gives a website to refer to for more detail. Saw no need to refer. Rescheduling info perfectly clear and acceptable, if not all that desirable. 

However today go online to check the booking. Website says booking number must be changed as flights have changed. Attempts to change result in messages re technical difficulty and need to phone handy 24 hour line, apparently in Istanbul. Phone number less handy than described. Repeated attempts abort at different stages of the press one press two scenario but all do fail. Occasional operator references to quality control but same not in evidence. Find phone number for Turkish Airlines at Ercan, also advertised as 24/7 but no answer. Repair to North Cyprus Expats pages on Facebook for advice, or at least sympathy, but no real joy. 

Consider that at least taxi, driven by friend of Hassan, is booked early so all may be sorted at airport. Friend arrives at eleven as promised. Asks on the way what time our flight is. Tell him four. But they won’t let you in the airport until three hours before. Also informs us that Turkish Airlines is famous for not answering the phone. We consider that at least the night is warm. Arrive 11:30, early enough to score two of the six outside chairs. Presumably early enough to have Turkish Airlines sort problem should they be so minded.

Allowed in at one as promised. Girl at desk not remotely interested in our booking and ticket numbers. No need to ask for assistance changing booking number, seemingly essential procedure online. Does examine very carefully our UK passenger locator form, used by UK to trace covid contacts should need arise. Extremely detailed info submitted less than 48 hours before arrival. Arrivals from Canada required to quarantine when landing in the UK but not, happily, those who are coming from Cyprus - or Turkey. Probable reason slightly amusing. Canada has significantly better stats than Turkey and even somewhat better stats than France, also on the UK’s gold list. Not a question of reciprocity, either. Cypriot allowed in without quarantine, which is not the case with Brits going to Cyprus. But British quarantine regulations were designed mainly to please British citizens desperate for summer holidays in the sun without their having to quarantine on return. Canada is not what they are thinking.

But through security and - two and a half hours later -  on the plane. Announcements in Turkish and English, with some quaint touches. We are referred to as dear customers and reminded of the need for social distancing - though the plane is too full to make that meaningful. Given small sealed packages with two disinfectant wipes and a face mask each. Disinfectant wipes handy for wiping down the water containers distributed by a stewardess, which she allows the none too bright man in the aisle seat to pass along to us.  Man should, actually have had the window seat and J the aisle, which he prefers, but proved incapable of understanding the seating diagram so J gave up. 

Five forty land at the new Istanbul airport, the largest in the world. But tomorrow is another day.

Tuesday, August 4/2020

Up early - well for some reason we always are lately and it will make for some interesting time zone adjustments when we go home, as there’s an eight hour time difference. Moving west is supposed to be easier on the body, so the scientists say, but have always found east less difficult. Though that may be because it’s easier to hit the late morning sunshine in a new country than it is to find myself prowling round my brother’s house at four in the morning (read 10 UK time) looking for something to eat and hoping not to wake anybody.

Early start good for walk over to Fehmi’s surgery in the old city for a chat before his dentist day begins. He’s retiring by degrees - works mornings, not starting unduly early, and usually finishes by about one. Seldom works Fridays. But kindly willing to adjust for long term patients, some of whom he has known all his life and others who have come regularly from places like Germany for decades. Filiz is there as well and Fehmi’s new assistant makes Turkish coffee for us. Lovely and relaxed. Hope we’ll be able to come back next year.

Even by the time we’re walking back shortly after ten it’s noticeably hotter and, more to the point, the shadows are receding so less of the walk is in the shade. I have somehow, in the last couple of weeks, contrived to lose my hat. J has gallantly lent me his but we pick up another on the way back. Fortunately, while his is a Tilley the one I lost was inexpensive.

In the evening we get the news of the horrific explosion in Beirut. Obvious that the initial casualty figures, dreadful as they are, will soon be much higher. We’re in the same time zone as Beirut, so shortly after six PM. About 200 km away as the crow flies. And appear to have been practically the only people in Cyprus who didn’t hear and feel the explosion. And no, we weren’t listening to the 1812 overture or anything else. Other people say their windows rattled.

Fifteen years ago we were in Beirut a couple of days after former president Rafik Hariri was killed by a car bomb. In fact his coffin and those of the others with him were still downtown in Martyrs Square to allow people to pay their respects, and it was clear that those who did so included everyone - Sunni, Shia and Christians alike. Felt a little like America after JFK’s death, a national tragedy that hit everyone, not just political sympathisers. And one of the memories that sticks is of people sweeping up broken glass from windows that shattered miles away from the bomb site. And that was a much smaller explosion.

Monday, August 3/2020

Six cats hoping for handouts and settling for shade

Last day of the four day holiday. Supermarket and pizza place have remained open. Pharmacies, interestingly, subject to government hours and limited to the duty pharmacy in each area. Have had no real need to go far and the heat is significant deterrent in business hours anyway.

Watching the masks beginning to disappear as people, not entirely logically, start to assume there is no problem here. After many weeks of no new cases did people assume magical immunity? Standing outside our building waiting for J (and photographing the ever hopeful cats) and see a man about to enter the building come up to one who has just exited it. No masks, although admittedly they are outside. But the Anglo in me - and, oddly this is cultural - thinks that they should not leave unnecessary regs on the books but actually enforce the ones that matter. There is no need for people outside and not close to anyone else to be wearing masks, and leaving the requirement to wear them outside your own home regardless just makes people think the regulations are pointless. On the other hand it is unfair and ineffective to leave enforcement in shops down to staff, many of whom are young or easily intimidated. Shops should be able to say that they’re sorry but they would lose their operating licence if they allowed it the same way pubs are unapologetic about legal requirements. But back to the two neighbours outside our apartment building. Forget the masks. Totally unnecessarily, acting out of long habit, the men shake hands.

It was inevitable that once flights were allowed in there would be cases, and the rules are still pretty strict. A test before leaving country of origin - think it’s in the area of 72 hours before, but specifics have changed and not on the list of things I need to know. Then another test on arrival at the airport and bus to quarantine hotel, where passport returned. Think that you’re now released from quarantine after seven days assuming both tests negative. 

Has worked pretty well despite a couple of well publicised slips. But assumptions that there could be no community transmission in the near future are ill founded. North Cyprus is in as good shape as it is - currently 28 cases but a good handle on where they came from and how they’re being treated - because of early severe lockdown and extremely good contact tracing. Only have to look at Melbourne, Australia, which has just called out the army to enforce a new and seriously escalated lockdown, to see what happens when the virus has not been eradicated but a significant number of people have decided no more problem.

Sunday, August 2/2020

Had noticed how quiet the streets seemed this holiday weekend and imagined families inside for the heat but gathering to happily celebrate Kurban Bayram together. However TRNC online news service LGC paints a less sanguine picture:

The item concludes by saying that on Friday the Turkish lira had fallen further so that a pound sterling was worth 9.12 Turkish lira and a euro 8.25. My sources say the euro today is valued at 8.21 lira but the implications are the same. When we arrived March 10 the euro was worth 6.98 lira. That’s inflation of nearly 18% in less than five months. “This means that businesses can no longer afford to pay the rents on their business premises.”

Saturday, August 1/2020

Bayraktar Yolu Sokak 48

Our apartment building, home since July 15. Not actually a very long walk from the old city - we used to walk over to the market every Thursday morning. The only deterrent is the heat unless it’s early morning or evening. Would have worked better if the lockdown had not been during the weeks when the temperatures were most moderate, although the countries that waited to lock down have not, unsurprisingly, done nearly as well, so no regrets.

Photo was taken standing in the shade, which is the shadow of the supermarket next door. The structure on the left of the photo is the municipal market, so couldn’t be much more convenient re grocery shopping. Our flat is the one on the top floor left hand side. Four flats per storey. It’s actually two bedroom, although only our bedroom and the open kitchen/sitting room area have air conditioning units. The smaller bedroom does have a fan but we only use that room to store our suitcases.

The view from the balcony is a bit difficult to appreciate from a photo, or at least one of this quality. Immediately behind the buildings is the Mediterranean, maybe a kilometre away, but the thin visible strip of it behind the lower buildings tends, with any haziness, to blend with the blue of the sky. The farthest distant trees to the right are in the old city and the stone coloured bit immediately underneath the red triangle far right is the mosque in the square of the old city. Market building is in the foreground to the right of the balcony.

Friday, July 31/2020

Definitely hot. According to Accuweather, which is sometimes not as accu as one might wish, 42 this afternoon. Have no independent means of checking it, as we accidentally left our little travel thermometer behind when we moved. Try standing on the balcony. Wall of heat. But is it a more solid wall of heat than when the temperature is 34? We go out in early morning or evening but often it’s quite nice on the balcony for morning coffee. 

Meanwhile unenviable records being set in Baghdad; 51.7 on Wednesday. The electrical system unable to keep up due to longstanding problems - such as war - in maintaining the infrastructure. So power cuts affect air conditioning, for those who have it. Even fans unable to function. The simple truth is that there will inevitably be deaths of those most vulnerable.

Very very quiet today. Few cars, and certainly no signs of animal sacrifice. Traditionally would have been goat, sheep, cow or camel.  Assuming camel mostly limited to desert, and probably shadeless locations. Suspect urban dwellers here quite pleased to settle for acquiring a professionally butchered animal from an air conditioned shop. Although Monastir, in Tunisia, where we last experienced this feast, with the gutters running blood and under its Arabic name of Eid al-Adha, would have had at least as large a population as Famagusta but much poorer. A whole animal, or at least a large portion, not only fits with the theme of Abraham’s sacrifice but provides enough meat for the three way sharing with family, friends and the poor.

Thursday, July 30/2020

Sunflower seeds join the regular market fare

Sundown is the beginning of the most important Muslim feast of the year, Kurban Bayram, the holiday celebrating Abraham’s willingness to obey God even to the point of sacrificing his son. Traditional observance includes the killing of an animal and sharing the meat with family, friends and the poor. The slaughter can be a hazardous undertaking, as this report from Turkey last year recounts:

This is the holiday known in Arabic as Eid al-Adha in Arabic, and we were in Tunisia in 2008 when it was celebrated. On that occasion we had seen what looked like - and indeed turned out to be - blood in the gutters and noted the previous day a very reluctant sheep being led by a rope. No such indications here, though it’s early. Tomorrow would be the more likely day.

Expect market to be very busy, and it is, although probably no busier than usual. Cherries still at their peak, citrus virtually gone and no cherry tomatoes in sight. Plenty of other fruit and veg though, and - first time this year - sunflower seeds, still in situ.

 

Wednesday, July 29/2020

Short trip to the supermarket next door. Have never seen a customer there without a mask, though I did once see a man remove his mask to cough into his hand! Have no idea what he was thinking, although probably it was long habit mindlessly asserting itself and thought didn’t enter into it. 

J examines the bill when we get home. As in most countries, tax is included in the price marked on the product or the shelf. Fewer surprises at the till, although I understand why the Canadian Consumers Association prefers separating price and tax in the mind of the consumer - it’s harder to get away with stealth rises in tax or forget about unstealthy ones. Bills here do tell you what the rate of tax on each item is, though, and it’s interesting. Twenty percent on the whisky and ten percent on the ice cream. Everything else including the (salted) peanuts is 5%. Not all food items, either, as there is a package of paper towels included. 

For interest sake compare the whisky with same in Ontario, where the cost is a little more than two and a half times as much per cl. Presume that Turkey gets no better a deal than Canada when importing Scotch whisky, so the difference will be tax rates.

Tuesday, July 28/2020

Morning commentary from the Health Minister, sort of appropriately named Ali Pilli. Contact tracing has been done re the man who absconded from the quarantine hotel when his COVID-19 test was declared positive. Turkey has been notified and he is unlikely to get away with it. Of course he may be happier about doing jail time there than here. I wouldn’t be. Also, in the future hotels are to be held jointly responsible with those quarantined for anyone leaving illegally. Sounds a bit harsh. Assume that fire regs would prevent locking people in their rooms. Armed guards at the doors? Locked windows to prevent tying sheets together and descending from upper floors? They already have security cameras but they’re a bit after the fact.

In the evening word from TRNC Prime Minister Tatar is that since July 1 there have been 15,000 passenger arrivals here, all of them tested, and under 30 positive cases. So not perfect, but does seem that so far they have things pretty well under control.

Monday, July 27/2020

Well, high drama in our small country. Dependent on a translation from a Turkish source here but the outlines are clear. A man, presumably newly arrived in TRNC was sent to quarantine to await his PCR test results. He should have had a negative test shortly before coming to the country. Quarantine will have been in one of the designated hotels, with a signed undertaking to stay in his room until officially permitted to leave. No armed guards, obviously. Allowing for a few translation glitches the story I have is as follows:

Online responses mostly angry, and with justification. Complaints that given the length of time between his leaving the hotel and the ship sailing the police should have got him. Mention of a helicopter circling over Kyrenia. The “ship” will be the regular ferry that goes from Kyrenia to Turkey and back. We’ve been on it, or its predecessor, although that’s nearly twenty years ago now. And the escapee has a Turkish name. Probably a Turkish citizen.

At the same time there is a certain farcical quality to the whole thing, some but not all of which comes from the lapses in the translation. “his room was searched but [he] was not seen inside”.
Visions of the man standing behind the door sucking in his gut. Then the report of the security camera showing the culprit, suitcase in hand, running out the back door and heading for the port. Reprehensible, dangerous, and somewhat keystone kops.

And finally there is some reassurance in the immediate response of police, health ministry, even helicopter involvement. Some reasonable faith in contact - and convict - tracing.

.

Sunday, July 26/2020

Pizza restaurant round the corner from the supermarket next door. Really more of a takeaway place although there are a couple of tables in the nondescript room and you could eat there if you had nowhere else to go. Actually you can enter and exit the supermarket through the pizza place and it’s handy to be able to order the pizza first and then pick up what you need from the store while it’s in the oven. Get a bottle of shiraz, having made the happy discovery that there are in fact more of the nice one we bought the first day, just not in the same place.

Just about to open the front door to our apartment building when we see the couple who own Minder, the excellent restaurant with traditional Cypriot cooking, locking up. The restaurant is on the ground  floor of our building but has a separate entrance. J tells him that we’re sorry it isn’t open - we go every year. The man is quite serious. They can’t. It’s not safe. They’re over seventy and can’t afford to take the risk. We agree. We too are over seventy and risks are not worth it. He brightens a little though when J says we’ll be there next year and I add Inshallah [literally God willing, and technically Arabic, but widely used in Turkish for things one hopes will happen].

Saturday, July 25/2020

The unreliable I. Listen in the night to a podcast discussing the utter unreliability of memory even when people are most certain of its accuracy. As they recount, all one has to do is google Brian Williams to be reminded of the newscaster’s classic invention of a “memory” of a wartime event that he did not in fact experience. And, even more surprisingly, the deeply held beliefs of many people regarding what they were doing when they first heard the news on 9/11 are demonstrably wrong.

A false memory of my own is of the same order. As a child I met a man whose father had been killed (as I remember him telling it) by suffragettes who mistook him for Lloyd George. But decades later, when I realised that this must be a googlable event, it became clear that he must only have been injured, albeit by murderously inclined women. Obviously the man would not have described this as being killed. Rewritten in my memory.

And a tiny example today. The sign outside the supermarket asking patrons not to remove carts is not written in English only, amusing as that might be. Less amusingly my Anglo eyes immediately rejected the Turkish writing I did not understand and took in only the English instructions, which I remembered almost immediately after as being the only ones there. “Yes, I remember it well”.

Friday, July 24/2020

Coffee on the balcony in the early morning before it gets hot. Overlooking the city. Bit of breeze and surprisingly quiet other than on market day, though there is the occasional ambulance siren as we are on the route to the hospital. Market take down and clean up well into the night but nothing left of the debris by morning as a “zamboni” circles the parking lot getting the last bit of earth where the potted plants and seedlings were yesterday.

Familiar with three lots of non Turkish Cypriot immigrants in the North; Turkishs settlers from the mainland as well as families of Tturkish military officers stationed here, international students, and British and other European (increasingly Russian) expats. But read of another large group, although the stats are a bit dated, coming from the 2006 census:

“This is an extremely diverse group that includes documented and undocumented workers employed in agricultural, construction and manufacturing sectors, as well as in hotels, catering and casinos. Fieldwork carried out for my previous report within the walled city of Nicosia and some other areas indicates that the majority of these workers hail from the Hatay district of Turkey, near the Syrian border, and from southeastern Turkey.106 Many among these do not have Turkish but Kurdish (Kırmança) or Arabic as their mother tongue. Most are Sunni Muslims (quite a few are Shafi), although a significant number are also Alawites. They offer a cheap source of labour, constituting almost 35-40% of the TRNC’s labour force.“

Group is disproportionately male and not long term, workers who leave at the end of their contracts and are replaced by new lots.

Thursday, July 23/2020

Market day. Over in the morning to pick up a few things. Small aubergines three Turkish lira a kilo ($0.60 CAD, £0.34, €0.38). I put five in a bag and ask the price and the man holds up one finger and then makes a sign that I take to be a half. Hand him two one lira coins. He smiles patiently aa one might to a small child, comes round to my side of the counter, puts one more small aubergine in my bag, and hands me back one of my two coins.

Stop in again at the market close to seven PM on our way back from the mobile telephone shop. Expecting it to be less busy late in the day but not a bit of it. Those who work during the day are filling the stadium sized market building. Really crowded and while the sides are all open airflow I’m not comfortable despite our masks and say to J that all we really wanted was a melon and we can get one from one of the little trucks outside. As we leave a man tries to sell us some of his plums. There’s no one else around his stall, which is fine but we’re a bit slow to buy. They’re not quite ripe and there are better buys. He’s anxious for us to taste. We are not about to, of course. So he carefully polishes one plum at length on his shirt tails and offers it to me. I decline, obviously, but - forced into some show of reciprocal politeness - buy a kilo of plums. They will ripen.

Outside to the melon trucks, and head for one that has mostly honeydews. How many do we want? Three the man suggests. No, one. Think we’ve succeeded and ask how much. Five lira. Fine. Pay and discover there are two melons in the bag. For five lira ($0.98 CAD, £0.57, €0.63) it’s hard to argue. Can see why he wasn’t eager to cut the sale in half. But will we be able to finish them? 

Wednesday, July 22/2020

Copyright Harold Gray, of course. Don’t know the date.

Have acquired two sleeveless dresses made in India at the weekly market in the interests of a adapting to local summer temperatures. Dresses are blue and very similar, although not absolutely identical.  Reminds me of the old Little Orphan Annie comic in the weekend newspaper supplements of my childhood. Readers inquired whether Annie only owned one dress as she always appeared in the same one. In response a later frame showed in the background a clothesline with multiple identical red dresses.

Tuesday, July 21/2020

J needs a repair done to a broken dental partial plate - no, not new. So we head over to see Fehmi, after some debate over whether leaving early matters heatwise. Probably about five degree difference between earlyish morning and noon but more importantly the early morning shadows are longer. Skin less likely to burn and far more shady spots to walk. Fehmi at the surgery but no patients yet, so his new tech trainee brings coffee and we have a long chat. Memories of the 1974 conflict leading to more general history and a little politics. Fehmi with some fascinating additions, along the lines of you won’t find this in the history books but one of my patients was a retired general and he told me....

As we talk, the technician from the lab comes in and leaves with J’s plate. Then a couple arrive for dental treatment. Fehmi suggests we come back after lunch, so we head back to our usual spot, Fa Kebab. When we return, the plate is back repaired. Walk home distinctly hotter, and as predicted long shadows no longer in evidence.

Lift had been inoperative down to maintenance when we left but six flights down not bad. When we return, though, maintenance complete. Consisted of setting up entry solely by electronic code accessed by mobile phone. Memory of Hassan saying this would happen after the 20th. Do not count stairs to 6th floor, but competitive with the 86 steps in Sofia a year ago where no lift even theoretically available. 

A couple of hours later Hassan arrives with small Samsung mobile, relevant number and charger. Odd system but assume all will work well.

Monday, July 20/2020

Very quiet public holiday. Apparently there are usually parades and an aerial display but things toned down somewhat this year because of Covid-19, presumably in the interests of discouraging crowds from gathering. Think there was a bit more activity in Nicosia. Our supermarket open and Fehmi’s son’s restaurant announced on Facebook that it was open as well, so probably others too. If internet speeds are any indication most people are staying home and watching the buffering circle turn.

Temperature 38 this afternoon, so grateful for the air conditioning and not inclined to go far. J spots a car driving slowly around the extensive parking lots near the empty municipal market building. Then we notice that the driver is carefully signalling before each turn at the end of a bay and light dawns. An excellent place for learning to drive.

Sunday, July 19/2020

Sunday morning and one more reason to regret the loss of our corner shop. The organic eggs we bought at the weekly market are visibly less fresh than the ones we used to buy from the shop owner’s chicken raising friend. Well, you can see if fruit and veg are fresh but can’t look inside an egg until you crack it. Taste fine though.

Pick up a small pizza from the shop at the corner of the supermarket. Vegetarian sounds pretty well the same in Turkish as English, which presumably means it’s a word the Turkish borrowed. The shiraz we bought yesterday turns out to be quite decent - although, regrettably, it was the last bottle. Oddly, no Turkish wine or vodka, which is a pity because Turkey makes both in inexpensive and quite drinkable brands.

Flat very comfortable and pretty quiet considering the building is full of families. Occasionally hear the very small child who lives across the hall. In the air conditioning it’s easy to forget how hot it is outside. Nice on the balcony in the early morning and after sunset though. Reading some of the posts for the holiday commemorating the Turkish intervention July 20, 1974. Fehmi was in his early twenties then. Ulus not quite seventeen. And Famagusta essentially battleground where people they knew died. And reading a post of Ulus’s brings home a factor which we should have known but had never really considered.  The fighting and the fleeing took place in brutal July heat. The heat that has us waiting until evening to go for a leisurely walk.

Saturday, July 18/2020

Jane on her 80th birthday, February 2019

May have wished for full size supermarket when we only had corner shop, but already missing corner shop. Supermarket so much less personal even if some things a little cheaper. And only some things - 5 litre containers of water twice the price! So we buy the much better priced 15 litre container and J asks if he can take it in the grocery trolley (cart) as our building is only metres away. He doesn’t try to explain this given the language difficulties but must have an honest face as they agree. As we’re leaving the parking lot we pass a sign telling dear customers that they are not to remove carts from the parking lot. Sign, oddly, only in English, which is a definite minority language around here. Are only the English tempted to take the carts home with them or is it only the English who are inclined to follow posted instructions?

In the evening receive an email from Kevin, Bill’s younger son, saying that Jane died yesterday. We knew that she had been ill and in and out of hospital over the last few months, but a week ago Bill had still been hoping that she would be coming home soon. Jane herself always so cheerful that talking to her was a sure way to underestimate any medical problems she might have - one of the most positive and even tempered people I’ve known. Glad that she and Bill were able to visit Sioux Lookout last summer. Who knew it was the last possible summer for a number of reasons?

Friday, July 17/2020

Moving into a long weekend, as July 20 is a public holiday, Peace and Freedom Day. Cheerfully named as what it celebrates is the landing of Turkish troops to protect Turkish Cypriots from Enosis - the Greek Cypriot plan for political union with Greece. Extremely long, though interesting, story. Excellent summary in multi-party, bi-cameral report to UK parliament, should any reader of this blog wish to read it: https://web.itu.edu.tr/~altilar/tobi/Kibris/TheCyprusQuestion.html.

And in further political vein, the following via one of the expats. Have not yet verified the source, but difficult to imagine that extremely formal polite nastiness as anything other than the genuine diplomatic article. Clearly the South’s tourism industry is hurting - as whose isn’t - and there is some pressure on their government to stop business bleeding north over the border. The antipathy does come from deep and unpleasant historic wells. 

No particular panic from our point of view. If accurate it means we exit via Ercan in the North, which has some logistical advantages anyway.

Thursday, July 16/2020

Wake up in our new penthouse. Actually, it’s not - there’s another floor above us, but the view over the city is super. Very busy outside as this is Thursday, market day, and our flat overlooks the market and its extensive parking area. It was already busy last night as people began setting up and it’s humming this morning. Think it actually opens at 6:30. We’re awake not much later than that and they’re clearly busy. The parking lot isn’t full yet but it will be. We remember how far away Bill had to park and how few available parking spots there were when we used to drive up from Pyla. 

We go over after nine. Still early and we now have the luxury of knowing we can make a second trip a little later - no need to juggle the watermelon with the bag of organic eggs. Do start by locating a frying pan. The flat doesn’t have a microwave - and we miss it - but two decent pots doesn’t make up for no frying pan. Then the fruit and veg. Peppers, onions, courgettes, aubergines, mushrooms, tomatoes, cucumbers, plums, bananas, cherries. The colours alone are wonderful. 

Surprisingly we run into the grandmother and one of the other women from our old residence. Lots of smiles, but not enough language in common for conversation. Then meet Filiz and do chat. A fairly high proportion of the Famagustans that we know. 

Most of the produce is pretty inexpensive. The problem is never paying for it but sometimes knowing what to pay. Neither of us very good at catching the amount quoted after the weighing. My usual method is to overpay. Assume it will be a little more than five lira, say, and hand over ten. Makes for quite a lot of heavy change by the end of the day. In most countries it has the additional benefit of  disguising, I hope, the fact that I don’t actually know what I’m being charged. Really scarcely necessary here. Several times over the last few months I’ve overpaid for something by a coin or two and had the extra handed back to me immediately.

And the treat. J has been looking over the fish wagons outside and we choose some Norwegian salmon. Not giveaway prices on this, but beautiful. Proves to be beautiful when J cooks it for dinner too over the gas burner in the new frying pan. 

Wednesday, July 15/2020

Tuesday, July 14/2020

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.

Monday, July 13/2020

Go early in the morning to the cash point, hoping to take advantage of relative cool. And it isn’t too hot, although no breeze. However electronic message on screen saying to try later. Genuinely later, too, as immediate retry nets same result. Bank by now open, so inquire within. Not working? No, maybe half an hour. Could wait in nearby park or have coffee, but possible that maybe half an hour will become an hour and a quarter, so back home. Do pass a little white snail on the Venetian wall, though.

Probably the hottest day, although to be fair 38 on my app may well have been higher than our garden reality. Didn’t run out to check the thermometer. Besides, 100 used to sound so much more impressive. We’re the caught in the middle generation. People who can actually say we’re 250 miles from Winnipeg, so if you drive 100 km/hour you’ll be there by lunch. Or even it’s been over 30 degrees all week. I think it must be 95 today.

Wait until dusk to go back to the cash point. AOK this time. Walk through the old city coming back. Small and not so small groups gathered outside little cafés. Guitars in some groups, and singing. The last call to prayer comes as the last afterglow leaves the sky. We are so going to miss this place.

Reports online from expats being refused consular assistance to cross to the South. The demand from the South was sheer bloody mindedness to begin with. Demanding a test was one thing but the consular assistance was simply obstructionist. However it seems now that those with EU and Commonwealth passports are having their embassies and high commissions tell them that they are not being allowed to give them “permission” to pass. In the case of EU citizens, this is a violation of EU law, so eventually knuckles will be rapped and changes made. Commonwealth somewhat different, but at minimum their high commissions could be expressing unhappiness at the retrograde step. The Republic of Cyprus more than most countries, is eager to cultivate support and good will and to attract tourists. There is no need for countries to act as if holding their citizens hostage and forcing them to leave through what the RoC regards as an illegal port is no inconvenience. 

Having said which, we are not, of course, genuinely hostages nor unable to leave by other means, but the consular stance should be a little less supine.

Sunday, July 12/2020

Scrambled eggs for breakfast. Should have known that buying 30 eggs would mean an immediate move! Although less expensive than when re-roofing with long term shingles resulted in an immediate job offer in another province. Not much downside to leaving the extras behind. 

Looking at the clothes that have to be packed. Not a lot of them - there never are - but disproportionately warmer than we can imagine wearing in the foreseeable future. Although we do remember returning from Vietnam in August 1993 and looking forward to cool lake breezes after endless heat. The plane landed in Toronto and we looked out the window and saw, to our horror, the ground crew wearing parkas. Summer was over.

Saturday, July 11/2020

Aysel, our host, needs the place back for mildly complex family reasons. We told her no need to be upset. She’s been very good to us and we’ve been here much longer than anyone anticipated - four months yesterday. So our first plan was to try to book the little studio near the mosque that we looked at two weeks ago. We do book it, but manage to do so immediately after the owner had rented it to family members and before he had taken it off the airbnb listing. So plan B. More searching for inexpensive enough and central enough. The studio had ticked both boxes. It was very small, but only needed to do the two of us short term at this point. We’ve definitely lived in smaller, though we’ve rather become used to our little enclosed garden. Not quite the same going a block over to sit under the fig tree by the mosque. As enchanting, but more clothes required.

But we’re pretty lucky in the new search. Not quaint and not in the walled city, but not far away. An apartment in a building next to the market. So about as convenient as it could be really. Small supermarket close by, Thursday market on the doorstep, and an easy walk to the walled city. Bit of mixed happy sad irony. The apartment is in a building that we actually know. It’s the same building that has Minder, our favourite Famagusta restaurant on the ground floor. The sad part is that it’s closed for the summer.

And a final token of good luck. J finds a passion fruit on the floor just inside our open door. It was one we didn’t know existed. The four we do know are still hanging in place. They’re easy/to miss when unripe because the green fruit is camouflaged by the abundant leaves. And sadly it is unripe and they don’t ripen much after picking. It was a windy day and the fruit evidently fell from the vine above the door and landed just inside, a gift from the gods. 

Friday, July 10/2020

Noticed, not especially happily, advertisements on various iPad apps and internet sites calling the attention of British expats to the importance of funeral planning, with the sponsor’s assistance, obviously. I’m not a UK expat but can see that I do use a number of sites that they do, so fair enough. But the ads are becoming more frequent, and worse than that, more urgent - now often beginning with “Warning”. And a new phenomenon. After completing a little puzzle on one of my few game apps an AUDIO advert insisting on my pre-planning my funeral - with the sponsor’s kind help. What do they know?

Supper a plate the neighbours brought over from their barbecue last night. We’d already eaten so saved it for today. Skewered pieces of lamb and chicken, humus, salad and pita. They are such lovely people.

Thursday, July 9/2020

Early morning outing on market day. Pass the park with the crow statue and note the young person with the pram who was there when we stopped a week ago. I say person because actually not sure of gender - and not particularly concerned - but now realise that my first assumption was female in large part because of the pram, a fairly inaccurate method of determining it. We first saw him or her - slim, perhaps thirtyish, jeans and t-shirt - on the steps outside Fehmi’s surgery. Stopped to peek inside the pram as one does and were startled to see not a baby but two small rabbits. There was a heavy jacket draped over the hood, which seemed slightly odd in the summer heat but we didn’t think a lot about it. Transferring pets from one home to another? Last week when we stopped to sit in the park there s/he was again - pram, bunnies, jacket and all. Took a photo from a respectful enough distance it had no pixel quality at all and then forgot about it. But here s/he is again in the same park.

On to the market. This time focused on cherries. Gives new meaning to cherrypicking. And not easy to do, either, with mask helping to fog my glasses so that judging ripe but not damaged difficult - and no easier of course without the specs, though less steamy. Cherry tomatoes and peppers, small jewel like 🍆 aubergines, halloumi (helim in Turkish), sesame bread, and a flat of thirty eggs. Thirty eggs seems like far too much, despite the man’s cheerful assurance they are farm eggs, but as well as the provenance they cost hardly any more than a half dozen at the shop. Nearly a catastrophe, as some eggs slide between the cardboard holder and its plastic cover. The whole works is inside One of our Cloth bags and impossible to sort out until we’re home so we’re reconciled to scrambled eggs for lunch - possibly a large bowlful. But we’re in luck. Only one broken egg. 

As we pass the park the rabbit owner is still there, now lying sleeping on a bench. Homeless? Does seem probable. Have no idea whether there are homeless shelters here but can see that the rabbits, cute as they are, would be a bit of a liability. They were awake when we looked at them before but made no effort to escape. Reminding me of perhaps apocryphal stories of Romany infants in London drugged into quiescence as their mothers beg on the streets.

Wednesday, July 8/2020

See J, who spends most time around here in nothing but shorts and sandals and guess correctly “Ah, you’re going to the dump”. Well, not the dump, but the skip half a block away, a public distance calling for a shirt.

We are on the front steps after supper, having just finished small bowls of exceedingly good vanilla ice cream from the corner shop (their lemon ice cream is lovely too, but unfortunately comes in a container with half lemon and half grape, the grape not as nice). The kind lady from across the road - she of the beautiful home baking - comes over with another small circlet of powerfully scented jasmine. Fills the whole house with its perfume. Sad that only visual and auditory memories can be saved or shared electronically.

Tuesday, July 7/2020

Well it seems like the days of the produce truck are over. Didn’t come at all last week or today for its usual Tuesday afternoon stop. And for that matter the previous week may not have been worth his while. Not as many or as nice fruit and veg and fewer of the neighbours out buying. The offerings at the market are both cheaper and much better, but the market is only once a week and the purchases do have to be carried a fair way.

The cats along our road gather in the late afternoon. This time six of them hoping for handouts, arriving rapidly one after the other. Are they all responding to some secret cue or do the others follow  as soon as the first one makes a move, afraid of missing out?

We ourselves over to the deck outside Fa Kebab for şeftali. Pick the corner table for a nice breeze as the sun goes down. And a stroll afterward past a number of small cafés. Mostly locals, sometimes only for beer or coffee and a pastry, but always pleasant and relaxed. And safe. Not only pandemic safe, although pretty good that way too, but personally safe. Never hear about robberies or muggings, and it’s always surprising the quality of furniture and equipment that is left overnight outside shops and restaurants in the centre of the old city in the justified expectation it will still be there in the morning. Yes, there are police. We pass two sitting chatting in a doorway with a local shop owner. But it’s more than that.

Monday, July 6/2020

Watermelon truck - or more accurately watermelon and cantaloupe truck - passes about five o’clock, but we’re not close to finished the last watermelon, despite having bought pretty well the smallest one on the truck. 

Lady across the road brings us a small circlet of jasmine blossoms which she has threaded together. Within minutes the whole place is filled with lovely - and powerful - jasmine scent. Cats profoundly disappointed when she emerges from her house with flowers rather than scraps of food. But they’re in luck as she’s soon back with a container of food.

Sunday, July 5/2020

As usual, when it looks like things have stabilised they change:

So fortunately no air bookings to cancel, PCR tests to unarrange (or worse PCR test results to collect and allow to languish as their 72 hour validity expires, no taxis and hotels to unbook. In fact nothing has changed - yet. And then:

Suspect this one loses a little in translation. It suggests that the ministers have only just noticed that covid-19 is an infectious disease. In all fairness it’s more likely that what they mean, and may well have said in Turkish, is that considering that covid-19 is an infectious disease, further decisions and announcements regarding it will be the responsibility of the Ministry of Health rather than the Council of Ministers. Probably a good thing. Just thinking that they are more likely to have the appropriate expertise - when, unfortunately, remember bizarre statements of a Minister of Health not a five hour flight from here. Well, we’ll hope for better. 

Saturday, July 4/2020

Feels like the hottest day so far. And when we look at the Accuweather app it confirms our perception. Heat warning. Currently 40. Except that our wall thermometer outside the door only says 32, and am more inclined to trust it than Accuweather. The other day the shopkeeper round the corner was cheerfully warning us that the temperatures would be in the forties in July, but it sounded like the bragging cum threatening that Canadians from Northwest Ontario and the Prairies engage in when they say the local temperatures fall to minus 40. They do, but not for extended periods or even every year. 

Quick trip to the shop - about three minutes away - for water, ice cream and a couple of bottles of beer. Shop closed on Sunday and the water probably wouldn’t have lasted. Keep one four litre container in the fridge. 

Our street dead quiet. It’s village like anyway, with most of the business activity in the centre of the old city while we’re near the southern wall, but today there is a little bit of bird sound and a faint distant rooster crowing. Not a human in sight - they’re all inside with the air conditioning on. Even the street cats have disappeared, though none of them are house cats.

The cats do appear later, though, once the long shadows make more shade. And more importantly once they have sensed that the woman across the road is going to bring them some food, though goodness knows how they know that as she doesn’t do it daily and there’s no set time.