Monday, January 18/2016

Cool and showery in Larnaca, but roads closed in the Troodos Mountains due to heavy snowfall. Cyprus is such a small island, 240 km long by 100 km wide, so the mountains are about 110 km away by road - more like 70 km as the crow flies. It's not unusual to have mountain roads closed to non 4WD vehicles (or those without chains!) in winter. Totally closed much less common.

Sunday, January 17/2016

Sunday lunch. This time we go with Bill and Jane to Kofinou, a little village just south of Larnaca. There's a restaurant there featuring lamb kleftiko - baked in a traditional outdoor beehive shaped oven. Actually, later googling reveals that there are several (5?) kleftiko restaurants in Kofinou, which is known in Cyprus as the village to go to for the best kleftiko. It's also known for its refugee centre, prefab houses sheltering various refugees including, as of September some Syrians who sailed from Tripoli in Lebanon. (And also for its abattoir). 

Our meal is certainly very good, served with roast potatoes, preceded by salad (including very nice marinated caper greens) and followed by small pastries filled with anari cheese and Greek coffee. Quite busy and all the other patrons seem to be Cypriot, a good sign.

Saturday, January 16/2016

Walking up from the beach we see our friend Mr Walid outside the mosque. He's an Iraqi refugee who lives at the Sunflower and always stops for a chat. His life centres around the mosque and he is pleased to invite us in. We've often admired it from the outside. A beautiful building, 500 years old he says, stone with flying buttresses. We leave our shoes at the door and enter the spare, carpeted interior. J lends me his sunhat, but otherwise I'm pretty well covered. Very peaceful. There are books. Take one if you wish, he says, and J takes a small paperback Koran in English. A few young men are seated cross-legged on the floor for instruction or discussion. We admire the few pictures. The space is large, airy, and pleasant. A lovely, serendipitous encounter. 

Coffee at Harry's Café. Usually fellow coffee drinkers are local Cypriots, though there are also occasional tourists or others. A tall fair haired man, probably in his forties (although we're becoming less reliable estimators as everyone looks younger and younger) arrives with a (probably) Cypriot man. The language of conversation is English but not close enough to assess the accent - the Cypriot is quite loud but his companion inaudible. So play the guess nationality game. Not British or North American. Wearing a waistcoat with quite casual clothes. Not proof positive but material is shiny, satin-like, as opposed to, say, leather. Number two is footwear. Leather sandals could be from anywhere, but these with loudly checked socks. Number three is hair. Shoulder length proves nothing, but the combed straight back look almost certainly European. Concensus, including colouring, Northern European, probably Scandinavian or German. Other considerations are that he is carrying a sketch pad featuring a cartoon and that he is here outside of tourist season, so perhaps slightly atypical in his home country. An interesting pastime. 

Stop at the elephant store on the way home. Notice, not for the first time that unit prices are utterly unreliable, specifically in this case re Famous Grouse whisky, which we don't intend to buy and bread, which we do. The sign says, inaccurately, that a 550 gram loaf of bread at €1.39 is the same price per hundred grams as a 900 gram loaf for €1.99. (And no, I don't carry a calculator or do the precise maths in my head - some things just stand out as an insult to the intelligence). 

More obvious is the whisky. Two bottles of Famous Grouse, one 70 cl and the other a full litre. The full litre one sells for €12.99 (or €1.30 per hundred ml). The 70 cl bottle is €9.99 (or €1.43 per 100 ml). Fair enough. OK, I know. If anybody is actually reading this, they may well be distracted by the actual prices. €12.99 is $20.61 CAD or £9.94. And you can't begin to think about an acceptable blend for that price in Canada or the UK. I also know that in Canada you can't buy a litre of whisky; you'd have to buy 1.14 litres. If you're not Canadian, don't ask. I also know that if Jennifer is reading this she thinks I've totally lost it. Raye, this is where numeracy leads. BUT the thing is, the sign doesn't compare mls at all. It shows the price per gram. GRAMS of whisky? And furthermore it says that the litre costs €3.25 per 100 grams while the 70 cl bottle is €1.43 per 100 grams. Go figure!

Friday, January 15/2016

Decide on booking Athens instead of Sofia. An unnerving experience with hotel wifi speeds, although safe enough with a VPN. Constant finger crossing that the system won't crash mid payment. Aegean's site works so badly that in the end I switch to Expedia which, oddly enough, is cheaper even with the booking fee than Aegean's own non-functional site. Then have the good luck to think of Expedia.ca, so no change of currency as well.  Book hotel separately, the same one we stayed at two years ago - quite adequate but definitely not the kind of luxury that attracts hostage takers. Whole procedure invollves switching to the reception area for better internet connection. Feel thoroughly entitled to the small whiskey J pours on my return.

Thursday, January 14/2016

Meet at the waterfront for coffee. No rain, but a dark cloud forms. Still warm though, with people on the beach, some swimmers, and sailboats on the horizon. Stop on the way back at Top Kinesis, the travel agency that sold us the Nile cruise all those years ago. The girl we talk to totally gets the idea of the visa run. We have to go somewhere by mid-February. Preferably reasonably cheaply. Sofia? Yes, maybe.

Wednesday, January 13/2016

Tree planting day. Bill has two trees started in pots that need to be transplanted and they're big enough that moving them has become a two-person job. They pick us up after Jane's physio appointment and we head out to the British base for fish and chips. Stunning warm, sunny day. The restaurant is on the edge of the sea. See-through plastic windows still in place, so the view is a bit hazy, but in the summer they'll be removed and the breeze will flow through. J and Bill transplant a young grapefruit tree and one other. J says the soil is extremely dry when they dig down but the trees get a good watering. Home with a beautifully marbled. 

Thick slice of Bill's latest culinary production, rabbit terrine. Light supper after lunchtime fish and chips. Light maybe, but with terrine and marinated olives from Jane and Bill's tree indecently luxurious.

Tuesday, January 12/2016

Bus out to Vlachos where we're meeting Jane and Bill for dinner. Last visit there was mid-December when Jane was in hospital. We're early so go for a short walk and return as Jane and Bill are arriving - Jane for the first time using elbow crutches instead of the walking frame and moving fairly smoothly. Excellent meal as always. I order moussaka and J a mixture of chicken kebab and sheftalia sausages (a Cypriot specialty made with ground pork or lamb mixed with onion and parsley and grilled). Practically a meal's worth of leftovers to take home.

Monday, January 11/2016

Radio four interrupted with the news that David Bowie has died. Presenters clearly stunned by completely unexpected news, though it emerges that he had been suffering from cancer for the last year and a half. Tributes and reminiscences for the rest of the day. By evening the Cyprus Mail online has struggled to find a local angle, a little reminiscent of the apocryphal story about the Aberdeen paper that was supposed to have reported the sinking of the Titanic under the headline "North-east man dies at sea". The CM's heading is "David Bowie: Cyprus is my Island (Updated)" and the story mainly refers to the fondness Bowie's first wife had for Cyprus where she was born while her father was here working as a mining engineer. Clearly pulled out of the archives to meet the occasion.

Sunday, January 10/2016

Cambanella's for Sunday roast again. Or choice of roasts. The staff are all, or mostly family (apparently the daughter is a lawyer who still cooks at the restaurant on weekends). The woman who carves the meet seems terribly disappointed when one says no to a third slice. Maureen here as well as Jane and Bill. Bill fills a plate at the carvery cum buffet for Jane and she says, mildly, that she had specified thin slices. But we're all agreed - the woman doesn't do thin. 

Saturday, January 9/2016

Lovely weather again. Some tourists wearing shorts. Some locals wearing sweaters and coats. Speculate, not for the first time, on the rôle of culture and human physiology in establishing comfort norms re temperature. And surely perspiration is independent of cultural conditioning?

Friday, January 8/2016

Threatens rain but more or less doesn't. That is it rains, but only while we're having coffee and sheltered by the restaurant patio roof. Windy but not cold at all. Some people in swimming and the sea probably warmer than Ontario lakes in summer. Stop at the animal shelter charity shop on the way back, where the Thai woman that works there on Fridays tells us that she and her husband stayed home on New Year's Eve because the celebrations aren't what they were. No music this year, she says. Timed the fireworks from our window, I say - three minutes. Glad we celebrated chez nous, although a little nostalgia for the days when we'd take a bottle of sparkling wine and a couple of glasses out into the throng along the beach and join the ooohs and aaahs.

Thursday, January 7/2016

Jane has a physio appointment, after which she and Bill pick us up and we go for lunch at Cessac, at the Dekhelia base (British). It's more or less cafeteria style, but famous for its fish and chips, which live up to the reputation. Jane manages the walk from the parking lot with her walker, and observes that a disabled parking spot would be handy but would undoubtedly be used by the wrong people. Back to J and B's where we're given oranges from their tree. Bus home.

Wednesday, January 6/2016

Winter over! Seems like it anyway, and nice timing as today is a holiday. The Feast of Epiphany always seems like a bigger event than Christmas in Cyprus, although it may only be that Christmas is more familial and celebrated in the home whereas Epiphany involves public events and parades. Super day - sunny and a high around 20 in the shade. Some in swimming and quite a few tourists around. Not as crowded on the waterfront as on previous years, though there are a number of booths selling everything from cotton candy and roast chestnuts and corn cobs to cheap jewellery and religious items. When we arrive the (arch?)bishop is still on the pier. There has been a procession from St Lazarus Church, ending with the bishop throwing the cross in the water and young men diving for the honour of retrieving it. Retrieval always successful as it's tied to a cord. We do see the procession heading back. It's always a little disturbing as a symbol of non-separation of Church and state. Large numbers of cadets bearing a large cross, soldiers with unpleasant looking automatic weapons, a military band, and heavily vested Church dignitaries. Nationalism, religious loyalties and a certain amount of xenophobia heavily combined. 

Harry's café open and along with our Cyprus coffee we're served two small lokoumades, round honey soaked doughnuts that are traditional on this day.  Back on the beach carnival atmosphere continues and we stop for our annual ice cream cone. Home with sprigs of eucalyptus leaves from the pier, left after the parade. Beautiful scent in the flat.

Tuesday, January 5/2016

Rain and cold. What passes in Cyprus for winter. The newspaper reports that police on Sunday wrote up 136 businesses for continuing to trade on Sundays while forbidden to do so. There's a continuing dispute over whether Sunday trading should be determined by executive decision or parliamentary legislation. Pending a supreme court decision stores should remain closed, with the exception of small corner shop types. One reader is enraged, writing: 

"So the police have lots of time to issue notices to shops staying open on a Sunday. Why don't the police stop all those driving whilst using a mobile phone, going over red lights, parking and blocking pedestrians on pavements, parking on zebra crossings, double parking outside schools, driving with children in their cars who have no seat belts, stopping motorcyclists who have no number plates or helmets on, stopping the many, many vehicles belching smoke out of their exhausts,..." Fair point as all of the above are huge problems, with people using wheelchairs or pushing prams forced out onto the road as the sidewalks are blocked by parked cars.

Monday, January 4/2016

Photo courtesy of Cyprus Mail

Winter. Cold and rainy and a good day to be inside. But a good day, it would seem for the birds. According to the newspapers they're back - the flamingos that winter at the 2.2 square kilometre salt lake near the airport. There were some there in December but they've been joined by many more - the estimate is 10,000. The salt lake was, until the 1980's, a source of salt for export, taken by donkeys down to the harbour. When we stayed at the Athene it was walking distance. It's not really now, although might be possible using the bus one way. The flamingos are a bit unpredictable, though. Not easy to tell which side of the lake they'd be on.

Sunday, January 3/2016

(Maureen and Jane. Bill's beer seems to have wandered into the photo too)

Sunny, and much less windy than yesterday. Buses on the Sunday schedule less frequent, but the 425 along Dekhelia Road goes every half hour seven days a week. Take it out to Cambanella's Restaurant. Have memorised the landmarks and do know where to get off, but the driver, rather sweetly, is concerned on our behalf. Another passenger (young Philippino woman, the only other passenger at this point) kindly puts him straight, as she's getting off at the same spot. Arrive just as Jane and Bill and neighbours Iris and Maureen are going in. Jane's first physio appointment has clearly made a lot of difference, and three more scheduled this week. Cambanella's usual Sunday roast. Starters, choice of four roasts - beef, pork, lamb, and chicken (or all four if anyone wanted and could hold it), roast potatoes, Yorkshire pudding and veg. Apple pie, cheesecake or crème caramel for dessert. Always the same, but always good. Maureen turns out to be, originally, from Kilburn, home of our favourite London café.

Saturday, January 2/2016

Jane messages to say "have not used W /C all day today.......improving.

So am now able to stand & walk but still need Zimmer to rest on." I read this with the traditional use of WC, meaning loo or toilet and am puzzled. Surely not having used it all day can't be good news. And this is improvement?! Read the rest of the message, which refers to our meeting tomorrow at a restaurant for a Sunday meal: "We are leaving w/c at home so it'll be a v slow arrival". Slowly the penny drops. W/C in this case is wheelchair!

Friday, January 1/2016

New Year's Day. Winter, or what passes for it here. Not wet, but chilly enough to wear J's windproof shell over my blazer. We're invited to Bill and Jane's for dinner. Bill's doing the cooking, as he often does even when Jane isn't incapacitated. It's fairly impressive, too. The soup is a venison purée and it's followed by duck breasts with orange. Unusually, we eat inside. Without the wind it would be ok in the sun. Sunday schedule for the buses, so we get on as the bus heads into Pyla to check the route and timing. Timing always a bit problematic in Cyprus. Drivers quite considerate about letting you off at a convenient spot or waiting for a mother struggling with toddlers, but have no problem running ahead of schedule to allow for coffee at the end of the run, and quite likely to, totally illegally, use the phone while driving.

Thursday, December 31/2015

New Year's Eve, and for once we don't even really give lip service to the possibility of going down to the waterfront. Free wine and beer with the fireworks and probably a young and festive atmosphere. But better quality drink here, and quite cosy. The clincher is that the fireworks - which we can see from our sitting room (although not quite as well as if we were able to remove one particular building from the line of sight) - are shorter every year. So online greeting exchanges as the new year moves west from Australia. Midnight North American central time 8 AM here. Time the fireworks. Right- only three minutes so much better here - and raise a glass.

Wednesday, December 30/2015

Bus to Pyla. Jane in wheelchair, but we go out for a walk around the neighbourhood. Meet Bulgarian neighbour with small dog. Neighbour as affectionate, voluble - and totally incomprehensible as ever. Identify (tentatively) one word. Może, same as Polish for maybe, and accompanied by "who knows" gesture. Wheelchair significantly heavier than it looks.