Saturday, March 19/2011

Sunny and surprisingly hot in the noonday sun. We take a morning walk along the sea edge of the old town. Albufeira is not only hills but huge sandstone cliffs towering above the fine sand beaches. It's a little reminiscent of Cornwall. There are massive cliffs - and plenty of restaurants and bars atop them, but not blocking the view. Lots of lookouts and the beaches occupied but not crowded. Back through the lanes around the square.

Also trek up above the old town to Lidl to get a few groceries at more normal prices. It's at least a mile, though, and nothing in Albufeira is on the level, quite literally. Like all Lidl stores it's a mix of international and local goods - local in this case including three foot long slabs of dried cod. We're more modest in our purchases - grapes, yoghurt, onions, lettuce, tomatoes, and a package of amazingly lean spareribs (€5 - $7 CAD or £4.38 - for 1200 grams).

Friday, March 18/2011

Wake up to see the rest of our surroundings. We're on the ground floor with a little patio overlooking the pool. There aren't many flats but they're all white and tile, and a few sun yellow sun loungers by the pool. Gulls overhead.

We're in Albufeira old town and a five minute walk from the beach and the tourist streets around the square. There's a tunnel through to the beach and several streets and lanes, cobbled, some with little Moorish looking arches and restaurants, bars and tourist shops. Sunny and any number of places to stop for coffee or beer.

Ask at reception about supermarkets, having seen the high prices and pathetic produce at the corner shops. Well, there's one near the cemetery; sometimes open, sometimes closed. It's open, but we seem to be the only customers and we can see why. The prices are horrific and not really compensated for by quality or variety, unfortunately. but we do get a few things as a start, and on the way back stop at a little shop for what later proves to be a perfectly drinkable bottle of red for €1.95. There's no sign of a clerk at the till here so I gesture with the bottle toward the two old-timers sitting warming themselves on a bench outside the door, thinking one is the proprietor. He's not, but when he bellows "Joao" a bald man shuffles in from an adjoining room and takes my money.

Thursday, March 17/2011

Wake up knowing there's all kinds of visiting time - flight not until 5:10 - but where does it go (the time, not the flight). Tea and Chelsea buns and talk. And we do book Jean online on a trip to New Brunswick in May.

Then off by tube and train to Gatwick. Was one o'clock early enough to leave? More than. EasyJet flight is due to leave at 5:10 and gets off the ground at 7:10, en route to Faro, Portugal. Usual herding and squashing. but the little man (honestly, shorter than me) with the transfer van is there, and, half an hour later, we're at the hotel in nearby (half hour drive) Albufeira. And reception has stayed open half an hour past their 10 pm closing time, so we're not standing in the street phoning them on the mobile.

The studio is large, airy and very clean. Massive bed turns out to be two singles pushed together and covered with a magnificent bedspread. There is a quite decent small fridge, two burners, a small microwave and a tv with a fair bit of English. And we have free wifi in the room with a fairly fast connection - so our alternative to CNN is BBC World or Al Jazeera on the netbook. Very nice.

Wednesday, March 16/2011

Moving day. The packing is basically done, but there are always the sorting out and bits to do. Too many grapefruit, and jars to the recycle bin. The calendar with the old photos of Larnaca that nearly gets left behind because we're so used to seeing it on the wall that it looks like it belongs there.

Then with Maggi out to the Tekke - the mosque on the salt lake near the airport. It's high on the list of Moslem holy places, being the burial place of Mahammed's aunt/foster mother (depending on whose account you read). But it's a lovely spot on its own with light breezes off the lake and bird song. A young hawk sits on a tall post and there are the usual hopeful cats. There are bits of exposed stone wall which we find following a sign for the remains of an ancient settlement but no further info. How ancient, who lived here by the lake listening to the ancestors of these birds? In the distance there are pink birds on the lake, but they aren't the flamingoes that winter here. Something smaller and a more delicate pink.

M drops us at the airport. The flight's an hour late, leaving us lots of time for people watching, though as with most airport renovations (in this case a whole new airport) the point was to find more ways for you to spend your money not to find more places for you to sit. It's hot but we spot one woman wearing suede winter boots with pink "fur" trim. It's interesting. One would have thought that culture and habit notwithstanding, perspiration would have the same trigger temperature.

Nice dinner aboard - moussaka, Greek salad and an ok Argentinian wine. OK that is until my newspaper knocks J's glass off the tray and he's wearing an amazing amount of it, pinkly there covering both front and back pockets even after a trip to the WC.

Terminal 5 is efficient if soulless. Twenty-five minutes from landing to boarding the tube, suitcases and all, so we're at Jean's just before 10. Tea and chat. There are samosas and curry? No, we're full - though tempted. But we do put J's trousers through the wash - and the wine vanishes.

Tuesday, March 15/2011

Coffee at noon with Margaret, from Terra Sancta. She and her husband moved to Larnaca 20 years ago, after he retired, but he died two years ago. She shows us a pendant he gave her - a hundred dollar Canadian gold coin, which he got in his sailing days and she had mounted. We are joined by her friends Helen and Richard, expats living in Kiti, just south of Larnaca. Then Margaret off to work at the animal welfare charity shop and J and I back along the beach.

The flowers are just bursting out now. They're there all winter but getting pretty shopworn by the end. Now the bougainvillea has new life and along the promenade there are beds of marigold, snapdragons, and petunias. Geraniums here are bush height.

To dinner at Vlachos with Maggi, Jane and Bill, Harry, and Jan, a friend of J&B whom we haven't met before. Elsa is in England, so Harry's holding the fort with the 6 dogs and 15 cats. Never any problem what to do with the leftovers from dinner. The food is so good that there shouldn't be any but so generous that there always are. Jane's moussaka would have fed at least two.

Monday, March 14/2011

Day one of packing - the easy stuff. Three months lets us get far too comfortable. lso trying to download bits of useful stuff on the netbook - like bus info on Albufeira. Predicting no free wifi.

Unsolicited email which I don't open headed "God will appreciate it if you help me relocate to your country."

Sunday, March 13/2011

Warm and suny. To 9:30 Mass, and ashes for those who weren't out on Wednesday - like us. Out in the afternoon to the promenade, which is beginning to pick up now with more tourists arriving. Coffee outside the café on the beach, with a bit of a concert in the background at the bandstand

Lauren's baby was born last night - a boy called Dallas.

Saturday, March 12/2011

Sun and warmth back. J and Maggi and I back to our regular café for Cyprus coffees. Maggi takes the red wrappers from the little Italian biscuits to use as a shim under the wobbly table leg. Sad thinking it's our last market Saturday.

Friday, March 11/2011

The coldest morning of the year - seven and a half degrees when we wake up. January was much warmer. It eventually struggles up to 16, but there's not much sun. Usually the official high is misleading as it's much hotter in the sun.

Thursday, March 10/2011

Jane, Bill and Maggi to dinner. So back to our student days as far as space and crockery are concerned. As far as actual cooking facilities are concerned too. We have a hot plate with two burners. One and a half really, as one starts malfunctioning midway through preparations. No oven. We do have (our own) microwave, though, unknown in our student days. Bill and Jane have spent several years living on their boat (catamaran now up for sale) though, so they're well used to cramped space and limited facilities.

J braises a nice beef roast (sold as beef blanco at Metro, so we have indeed taken pot luck) and slow cooks it all afternoon in our big soup pot, while I make red cabbage with bacon, apple and balsamic vinegar and carrots with orange zest. Then we start with veggies and dips and drinks when people come, which gives us time to boil the potatoes and reheat things. Our last bit of entertaining as we're about to start using up and packing up. Good company and interesting conversation.

Wednesday, March 16/2011

Final visit to the dentist as I get the replacement bridge put in and J has fillings to build up his lower front teeth. Happily there are old National Georgraphics as well as Greek magazines in the waiting room.

Sign near Carrefour advertising an interesting range of services:

EMPLOYMENT AGENCY
MARRIAGE AGENCY
GREEK LESSONS
TOURIST SERVICES
SINGLES CLUB

Something for everybody!

Tuesday, March 8/2011

We're about to go out when the black clouds roll in and it pours, so a reading afternoon, Ian kRankin alternating with Colin Thubron's Journey into Cyprus. Then, on the weather, we see the big blotch of cloud covering the eastern end of the Mediterranean, and at night the thunder and lightning follow. Then hail.

Monday, March 7/2011

The threatened showers never quite happen but dark clouds scud past, are replaced by sun and well up again from the hills to the west. But it looks clear enough to walk down to the beach, though too windy to bother taking umbrellas, which would be useless. We take filter coffees out to the small pier at the south end of the beach and drink them while watching boys flying kites on the beach. One lands in the sea and a father carefully reels it in. It's mostly tourists and immigrants, as the locals will have taken their picnics to the countryside, or at least as far out as the Tekke, the mosque on the salt lake, out near the airport, which honours the foster mother of Mohammed.

The Clean Monday picnics will feature vegetables, especially greens, and seafood. Lent begins today for the Orthodox, and fasting in the Orthodox Church means no dairy as well as no meat. there are certainly people who take the fasting very seriously, but in general the mood is the antithesis of Ash Wednesday. It's a joyful holiday and the preceding Saturday a very busy one in the supermarkets as people stock up for their picnics.

And we note an article on page five of yesterday's (Cyprus) Sunday Mail, headed "The Guilt-free Treat for Lent: Platres Shop Makes Handmade Chocolates Without Dairy Products." Apparently a box of chocolates for Lent can be had for €15.

Sunday, March 6/2011

After Mass there's a bookstand available outside, second hand books selling for 50¢ each. Quite a lot of light romance but we pick up a copy of The Bookseller of Kabul, an account written by a Norwegian woman, a journalist who had lived with the bookseller and his family.

On the way home we`re passed by a Cypriot woman, probably well into her seventies and dressed in the traditional black skirt and coat. She`s sitting ramrod upright on a motorbike, rolled stockings coming just below the knee and white helmet on head, unsmiling. Far better captured on film than in words, but we have no camera with us and could hardly have asked anyway.

Saturday, March 5/2011

After coffee - guess we can call it our café when the owner sees us sit down and says automatically two sketo (unsweetened Cyprus coffees) - we wander through the market. There's a large blue plastic vegetable bin with live snails. Cypriots gather them on the hillsides. J buys a big bag of grapefruit (he counts 21) for €1.70 (£1.45, $2.30 CAD). I stop at Prinos greengrocers on the way back. It`s crazy busy, since Monday will be Clean Monday. This is the day when the Orthodox clean the house and also cleanse the body of meat for the beginning of Lent. It`s not very penitential though, compared with Ash Wednesday in the western Church. Usually marked by countryside picnics featuring vegetables (especially greens - hence the crowding at Prinos) and seafood. Also by kite flying. A major public holiday.

Friday, March 4/2011

M off to Rome for six days, though she texts from the airport to say that the taxi she had booked failed to arrive and had to be reordered. Taxis in Cyprus are expensive, apart from the reliability factor. The standard price for a taxi from the airport to town is €15 (£12.75 or $20 CAD). For 50% more you can get a minicab from Jean`s in West Harrow all the way out to Heathrow 4. That`s much farther and furthermore both the price of petrol and the cost of living are significantly higher in London. But then the price of a slow-crawling taxi from the train station in Sioux Lookout to Moosehorn Road is well over $20, and petrol less than anywhere in Europe, so obviously there are other factors at play.

Thursday, March 3/2011

Stunningly beautiful day. J comes home in the morning with a large bag of fresh oranges but we wait until early afternoon to walk along the beach and over to our café to avoid the hottest sun. Maggi and Dino already there so we join them for coffee. Stop at the bakery on the way home and our favourite magro (black) bread, a dense rye with sesame seeds is still hot, so at home we start the meal with warm bread and salad, the bread still scenting the room.

Wednesday, March 2/2011

How did Gaddafi, with all the ability and inclination in the world for self-aggrandizement, only rise to the rank of colonel?

Tuesday, March 1/2011

Home from Damascus late last night, and this morning a dental appointment to have the bridge removed where I have a single missing tooth, as it's beginning to deteriorate. Feel a bit like a bit of antiquated plumbing or an old engine with rusted clamps as Xenia first tries hammering to dislodge the old bridge and then, with the hammer blows still reverberating in my skull, resorts to a miniature saw. Note the advantage to having a female dentist - less fist occupying the overstretched mouth. And her observations prove right: there are large holes in the metal of the bridge and it wouldn't have lasted much longer. I save it to show J.

To M's for g&t in the afternoon - the solace of a liquid diet after dental work.

Monday, February 28/2011

Last day, and as always too little time. Have to work out a way of getting a longer visa. Back to the endlessly fascinating souq. Yesterday we spotted what seemed to be several cafés with free wireless signs, so that seems like a good idea. though as soon as we start looking they seem a bit thinner on the ground. But we find one on Bab Touma, just off Straight Street in the Christian quarter, and even think to check as we go in that they do have wireless.

We turn down the Turkish coffee, as the accompanying water seems a bit suspect. Filter coffee seems incomprehensible to them, but Nescafé, unfortunately, doesn't, so we settle for it. However, the wifi simply doesn't happen. The young man suggests it's our computer or the weather. No - we have an excellent connection but no access. Ah well, the coffee is served at a table with a brocade cloth. It's a remarkable place - cave-like with rough stone walls and an interesting combination of ancient and new. As well as the dysfunctional wifi there's an excellent flat screen tv in one arched niche, the sound muted so that the picture of a singer contrasts oddly with the songs playing on the radio. There's a big open stone wall oven, now filled with more modern kitchen items. Up winding stone stairs to the loo. The ladies' is identified by a Minnie Mouse doll on the door, but the basin is handbeaten copper.

An early dinner on Straight Street. The restaurant doesn't look ancient but it's busy at four o'clock. All locals. We're first given a black seeded flatbread with two unidentifiable but delicious dips. Then leg of lamb with a bulgar and chickpea pilaf and seasoned ground chicken shaped around pistachios and sautéed, as well as rice with pine nuts. As we're leaving, saying no time for coffee or dessert, a huge tray of pastries are put in front of us - and our selections don't appear on the bill.

The Syrian guide reappears at Happy Nights to accompany us to the airport, this time on a bus with returning Greek cypriots. Everything at the airport is x-rayed, hand luggage twice. Queueing for boarding passes, J witnesses the Greek Cypriot guide asking an old man what he's doing in line. He says that he's not well and was told to go to the desk. No, she says, nobody told you that - go and sit down. And he does, reappearing later on the plane.

Once through security, we try to change money, but find it must be done before security. However a girl at one of the shops is happy to find a friend to help. It's technically illegal but there's so much giggling as we negotiate the rate that it's impossible to suspect undercover police. My comment that in renovations Duty Free comes first, well before WCs proves true. The loo is mixed gender and chaotic, the Duty Free state of the art. In Duty Free we do buy a mobile, Nokia 2700 Classic, a quad. Payment is in hard currency and change in US notes. If 50¢ is due you get a KitKat bar instead of coins.

The flight is posted on the monitor so we head to the departure lounge. Then, after queuing to have boarding passes checked and hand luggage through another x-ray (here, for the first time, a sign saying no liquids appears, but no one seems concerned), we are all asked to vacate - the flight is late. And twenty minutes later we`re called back. So home to Cyprus.