Family in Cyprus, and a lot of games :-)

We arrived back in Cyprus just over two weeks ago. It feels like months.  Sometimes it seems as if we have two completely different lives, each of which comes into focus as we arrive at our destination, while the other grows a little dimmer.  

 Two days after we returned, Daniel and Becky arrived for three weeks of holiday.  It was great to see them, and naturally we introduced them to our new game Agricola:

Later on, we played a round of Seafarers of Catan, while Cleo relaxed in the box lid: 

Agricola is quite a complicated game to learn, so the following day we tried again: 

On Friday, Tim arrived too; he's coming to live in Cyprus for a couple of years, which we're very pleased about.  We played some games with him too... and on Sunday, our friends came over, as they do every other week, this time with visiting parents.  We didn't have any board games that eight people could play, so one end of the table played Dixit: 

While the other end played Settlers of Catan: 

A few days later we had some other friends over for a meal and games - they had a visiting daughter and niece, making nine of us.  So, once again, we decided on two separate games. For some reason we divided by generations, the younger folk playing Dixit at one end of the table: 

While we chronologically challenged parents had a round of Tabloid Teasers: 

We've also played Bohnanza, Ligretto, Cities and Knights, Ticket to Ride, more Settlers, more Agricola.... almost every day we've played at least one board game. 

Then Tim set up an old computer to play simple computer games that he and Daniel remember fondly from about ten to twelve years ago.  There's something oddly aging about one's own offspring feeling nostalgic about games from their childhood... but they've all been enjoying them very much. I think this one was 'Worms, Armageddon':

Last few days in the UK...

Our last couple of weeks in the UK went by very quickly.  We didn't manage to get to see many friends in Birmingham, although we very much enjoyed meals with a few families who we've been close to for many years now.  All too quickly it was our final Sunday... and Tim was playing in the music group at Christ Church: 

As well as interviewing Richard about his work, they prayed with Tim and said an official goodbye to him, since he's moving back to Cyprus for a year or two.  

We had a new experience in our final week; the washing machine in my mother's house stopped working. It was quite old, and good timing in one sense... but we had only taken a week's worth of clothes with us. I tried doing some washing by hand but it wasn't very effective, and was decidedly messy. Then as there's no washing line, it was remarkably difficult to get things dry and I was worried about overloading the tumble drier. 

So we found a launderette  They're not all that common, apparently, but right by 'studentville' (the popular area for Birmingham University students) we discovered a small and friendly one, with a very helpful man who explained how the machines worked and estimated how many we would need.   We had taken several carrier bags of dirty clothes, bedding, and so on...  and ended up using three machines: 

It wasn't particularly expensive, but suddenly we could quite see why students are renowned for taking piles of laundry home to their parents.  I would have done too, if the only alternative was to use a launderette. Not that it was a problem once - it was quite an interesting experience.  But it would work out quite pricy and time-consuming to go there every week. 

It was while our clothes were churning away that we thought of a new problem: how we were going to transport the clean laundry back to the car?  There was nowhere to park nearby, so we were probably a couple of hundred metres away.  We could hardly walk through the streets carrying huge piles of wet washing... and we certainly didn't want to pile it back in the carriers we had used for the dirty stuff. 

So while Richard waited, I wandered around the local shops in the hope of picking up some useful 'bags for life'.

I had no luck at all. There were only small 'express' style supermarkets nearby, and none of them seemed to sell strong bags. 

Then finally I went into an art/craft shop.  And I found them. Possibly the ugliest carrier bags I have ever seen, not something I would wish to be seen carrying... but sometimes, as it's said, 'needs must'.  The bags were plastic, and looked pretty sturdy.  I bought four of them....

 They did make it easier to carry the wet laundry back. Since it had spun, we decided to use the tumble drier at my mother's house, rather than paying - and waiting longer - at the launderette.  And we also decided that this was an experience we did not particularly wish to repeat.

We spent a lot of time in our last couple of weeks clearing more of my mother's house, sorting paperwork for her, and had a major blitz day on our final Saturday, when all my siblings and their spouses came for the day. It was good to be all together again, albeit briefly.

Happily the bags had another use on our final Saturday, enabling my siblings to transport various small items home with them. 

Outing to Stratford while not in Cyprus

On Thursday, we had a day out.  One of my birthday presents was tickets to see 'As you Like it', in the new theatre in Stratford, by the Royal Shakespeare company.  Tim decided to treat us, and also himself; he's been to see plays a couple of times since living in the UK, but had not been to the new main theatre.

It was a matinee performance, starting at 1.00pm. We allowed plenty of time to get to Stratford, taking lunch with us to eat beforehand. We had no idea where to park, but then Richard spotted one that appealed to him:

It wasn't even too horribly expensive, by UK standards. 

The 'marina' nearby was just for narrowboats: 

We were amused that the small rowing boats available for hire were named after Shakespearean characters: 

We were very close to the big park which contains the theatre, and it was even reasonably sunny:

I wasn't so impressed with this statue, which (at this angle) looked as if it was picking its nose (ugh):

We saw lots of swans in the river, probably hoping for pickings from tourists (though I do know that one isn't actually supposed to feed bread to birds as it's not good for them). 

The new theatre is attached to the side of the old one, which looks very scruffy now, even with some broken windows:

We went for a walk, then sat in the park to eat our lunch.  Around 12.30 we went into the theatre, had some coffee, and then went to find our seats.  Photos aren't allowed during the performances, but I did take one beforehand showing the stage and the layout of the seats: 

'As you Like it' was amazing - it started with two of the main characters in modern dress coming out to sweep the stage... minimalist scenery, and a revolving part of the stage made it work beautifully, and the main actors were excellent. There was some great music too, and one piece in the second half which earned a round of applause on its own.

The RSC are renowned for not doing 'traditional' Shakespeare... and yet, watching this, with the men in modern suits and some decidedly bawdy humour and gestures, I realised that it was probably closer to the original concept which was, after all, contemporary as far as Shakespeare was concerned.  Here are some of the official production photos on the RSC website.

If I have a single complaint about the production, it would be the number of cigarettes smoked by actors and actresses! The air conditioning was good enough that we didn't smell anything, but it seemed like a very odd idea, which added nothing to the show, and was a terrible example to the many school groups watching.

I'm not a huge Shakespeare buff, but I do enjoy his comedies... and, as usually happens, I found that after the first half hour or so the language started to feel quite natural.  Out of curiosity I looked back to see which other plays we had seen in recent years; it really isn't many.  In 2010 we saw 'The Merchant of Venice' in Kurium (in Cyprus), which was excellent, albeit fairly 'traditional' in the way it was done.  The time before that was as long ago as 2006 when we saw 'A Midsummer Night's Dream', also in Kurium, with some very ingenious scenery.  We also saw 'Twelfth Night' in Kurium back in 1999.

We could remember, too, that we saw a visiting company doing something in a cultural centre in Nicosia, the same year that we saw 'Midsummer Night's Dream', but had no recollection at all of what it was.  Just as well I keep these records in this blog: it was the work of a moment to search through and find the event.  But I was very surprised to discover, on reading the relevant post, that in our cultural afternoon in Nicosia we saw, as we did on Thursday, 'As you Like it'.  We evidently liked it very much, but I had completely forgotten and was convinced I had never seen it before....

Selected people and places from the past month...

I have been procrastinating. Nothing new there, but it wasn't until today, when I received a note from a concerned friend, that I realised what a long time it has been since I last wrote anything on this blog. All the more concerning, I suppose, because my last two posts - over a month ago now - were about the Cyprus financial crisis.

But life continues, and it is more than time for an update.  Thank you, Rosemary, for inspiring me to pick a selection of photos and start writing.

Back in March, I continued walking on the Salt Lake trail three times a week with my friend Sheila... and although the weather started warming up, we had some rain too. Here are some quite big puddles that showed one morning late March:

Naturally we spent time with friends, and played some board games:

The last day of March was Western Easter.  Greek/Eastern Easter won't happen until May 5th (they are as far apart as is possible this year) but we tend to celebrate the Western one. We went to St Helena's Church with some friends in the morning, and then cooked and hosted a roast lunch for eight:

It all seemed to go well, and it was good to have several good friends together for a leisurely meal:

Cleo is fifteen now, and her coat is getting quite brown in places, thin in others.  She no longer runs and jumps as she used to: we suspect arthritis, but as she does not seem to be in any pain, we don't worry about it too much.  She still loves boxes of almost any shape and size:

At the other end of the cat spectrum, I must mention Makenzy, a kitten adopted by my friend Sheila and her family just a few days later, after she was found in a large dumpster: 

Makenzy is extremely cute.  She's also very friendly, unlike most feral kittens.  

Just to add to the randomness of this post, here's a jigsaw puzzle which Sheila started doing some months ago, and which a few of us helped her to complete early in April.  It was a remarkably difficult one, and we were very pleased that all the pieces were there: 

On Saturday 6th April I went for what may be my last Salt Lake walk for several months.  It was a beautiful clear morning, but even in the early morning it was beginning to be too hot for me:

I might have continued until the end of April, but a couple of days later we flew to the UK, where we are currently; we return to Cyprus on Greek Easter Day.

We flew to Heathrow, since - oddly - BA flights were the best value that week.  After booking our flights we discovered that renting a car at Heathrow costs a hundred pounds more than the same car (from the same company) at Gatwick. However, getting to Gatwick by coach from Heathrow would have cost us 50 pounds each, and by train even more (as well as being decidedly inconvenient with all our luggage).  Researching online revealed that the best thing to do would be to collect our hire car from Crawley (another 50 pounds cheaper than at Gatwick)... and to travel there from Heathrow via taxi.  Yes, whoever would have guessed that a taxi would be considerably less expensive than any form of public transport?!

So a very nice man met us at Heathrow and dropped us at the hire car place, giving Richard a chance to rest after flying before driving. 

We had heard dire warnings about the land of ice and snow, and told to bring lots of winter woolies.  So we were pleasantly surprised that on arrival the sun was out, and while 12C is not exactly warm, it certainly wasn't the arctic waste we had been warned about. 

We then spent a couple of days having a mini-break in the tiny town of Arundel.  It only has a handful of shops (including a rather nice second-hand bookshop) but it boasts a Roman |Catholic cathedral, rather unusually dedicated to two saints, one of whom we had never heard of:

Philip Howard, it transpires, was the Earl of Arundel some centuries ago, who refused to attend a Protestant church service. He was put in the tower of London for such treachery, and eventually died of dysentery. I'm not quite sure why that makes him a saint, or why he would share the cathedral dedication with Mary...

Here's a bigger view of the Catholic cathedral, which was impressively large:

The inn where we stayed was in the shadow of this cathedral:

... as can be seen from this view showing where we stayed, in what was probably once the stable block:

It was fairly basic but large and comfortable,with coffee-making facilities, and very peaceful.  Breakfast was included, so although Richard's breakfast is usually a handful of fruit and nuts (at most) while I usually opt for granola, fruit and yogurt, we both ate excellent cooked breakfasts for a couple of days: 

We didn't do anything terribly exciting; we just needed a couple of days to read and relax.  We did drive into the nearest reasonable sized down (Littlehampton); even though I don't really enjoy shopping, it was nice to browse a few traditional British shops: 

Later on we went for a walk around Arundel.  We saw that the Catholic cathedral was open, so went inside and found it peaceful and attractive:

It's obviously quite a lively place, with links to all kinds of ongoing activities.

We took a look at the castle...but we're not really into history, and it was quite expensive, so we didn't go inside. There was a craft fair nearby so we did wander around that, but didn't see anything of great interest. 

We walked along a path next to a stream and saw some ducks - something else we never see in Cyprus:

|After our mini-break in Arundel, we drove to stay with Richard's mother for a few days. Tim came down from Birmingham to join us, as she was celebrating a special birthday. We went out to lunch and were joined by other relatives, at a very pleasant inn:

Richard spoke at his mother's church on the Sunday, and then we drove up to Birmingham.  My mother recently moved to a small apartment in a residential home as she has been having some health problems, so we knew we would be spending lots of time helping to move furniture for her, to make an inventory for my siblings so that we can all decide if we want anything, and generally helping to clear the house, where Tim has still been living.  On Monday one of my brothers and his wife came down for the day, and we moved my mother's large bureau to her flat, followed a day later by a selection of her books:

Tim has been applying for jobs in the UK but with no success - nobody seems to care about academic qualifications these days; the important thing is to have experience.  He has a possible job offer in Cyprus, although it remains to be seen if this will happen - the financial crisis means that unemployment is going to be high, with many jobs cut.  Nevertheless, he made the decision that he will come and live with us again for at least a year, possibly more, and see what happens.  We are, of course, delighted.  

Richard had to ship some things for King Malu so Tim took the opportunity to sort out his books and his favourite chair, to add to the shipment. It was quite tight fitting everything into our small rental car:

Last Saturday was my birthday.  I was greeted with gifts from the immediate family, and several cards:

However it felt a bit odd that it was my birthday, since another reason for being in the UK right now is that my father was hosting a rather belated celebration for a special birthday.  During the meal my teenage nephew demonstrated an even greater appetite for roast potatoes than Tim:

.. and later on showed that he is almost as tall as Daniel:

Meanwhile. Daniel had bought a slightly random gift for Becky: 

We've been out to very enjoyable meals with two different sets of friends, but I forgot to take any photos. We've done a bit of shopping, a lot of sorting, and moved many more bits and pieces to my mother's new flat. Tim is trying to finish his MA assignments (other than his dissertation, which does not have to be complete until September) and we're trying to see other friends where possible.

While we've had two or three days of rain since our arrival two-and-a-half weeks ago, we've seen the sunshine most days, and a couple of times the temperature has exceeded 18C.  We really can't complain about the weather. 

And finally...on Sunday as I walked down the street I felt someone glaring at me.  The source turned out to be a cat, not quite the famous 'Grumpy Cat' but a decidedly disgruntled cat who seemed very unimpressed that I dared to walk past his home: 

I hope that it won't be quite so long before my next post!

Cyprus banking crisis: an update (of sorts)

It's almost a week since we woke up to the news that the Cyprus government was planning to take a 'levy' on all deposits in banks, up to almost 10% for those with more than €100,000.  

It was a topic of discussion wherever we went; some people shrugged and said that those with large amounts of money could afford to give some to the government. Some felt that foreign investors, who benefit from low tax rates, should certainly contribute. But it all seemed very unfair on the ordinary Cypriots and ex-pats, with much smaller amounts in our accounts, having to fund the almost collapsing banks from our own pockets. It's not as if we make any interest these days - nothing at all on current accounts in Cyprus. 

Moreover, one of the main reasons that Cyprus is in such financial trouble is that it helped to bail out Greece - and the Greek people did not have to forfeit any kind of levy.  

By the time the vote was taken in parliament on Tuesday, the plan had been adjusted slightly, so that those of us with less than €20,000 in our accounts would be exempt from a levy.  However, there were protests going on around the island, and clearly the government were listening to the people... so the proposed levy was rejected.  Not even by a close vote: 19 people abstained, 26 voted against. Nobody was in favour. 

Cue lots of rejoicing....

... Except that this potentially pushes Cyprus into a much bigger problem.  The banks were supposed to open again on Wednesday, but three further days of bank holiday were declared. E-banking is frozen, to stop people moving their money abroad, or to different accounts. We can't even pay utility bills online at the moment. 

By Wednesday, Richard was getting concerned. I don't keep much cash in the house - I take some out at the start of each month to cover petrol and local grocery shopping, but we were over half-way through March, and I had about €60 left. He was worried that the banks might close indefinitely, and I did realise that we might have to pay our phone bill at the end of the month in cash.  We were safe from a levy - or so it seemed - but if, as now is possible, the banking system collapses entirely, would we lose everything?

So we went to the ATM at our bank, half-expecting a lengthy queue. There was one person who left as we walked up to it, and it dispensed money as normal. I really don't like carrying more than the minimum cash around, but it's certainly preferable to having none at all. 

Then we drove to Metro, and bought some things with long shelf-life - such as cat litter, and toilet rolls, and instant coffee.  We used our debit card to pay, and it was accepted without problem.

Was the press over-reacting, we wondered? Were the Cypriots and ex-pats in general assuming everything would be all right in the end? Was this a rational decision, or head-in-the-sand?  The banks were closed to stop huge withdrawals of money which could lead to disaster, but it seemed a bit strange that the population were not queuing up to take at least a few hundred euros of their money out, to have safe.  Should the banks collapse, or indeed if Cyprus decides to leave the eurozone, all money might indeed be forfeit, despite the official EU guarantee of safety for all deposits up to €100,000. 

Yesterday - Thursday - Richard was at some meetings in Limassol. He said that in the afternoon he noticed long queues at ATMs, particularly those of Laiki Bank, the one reputed to be nearest to collapsing. We heard from friends that they were unable to take money from an ATM, and that while their debit card was accepted in two shops, it was refused at a third. We read stories of petrol stations only accepting cash.  It seemed that there was, after all, some widespread panic.  

Meanwhile the government tried to come up with further plans to raise the five billion euros needed if the country is to receive EU support for a further ten billion. The amounts seem  phenomenal, although it did occur to me that with 750 million people in Europe altogether, just €10 per person would raise 7.5 billion.  And would be a lot fairer than heavy levies on the people of this tiny island (whose population is less than one million). 

This morning we drove down to the Post Office so I could mail some cards, and also check for an expected large parcel (which had, indeed, arrived).  As I came out, I saw that there was a small queue at the Laiki Bank ATM.  I've fuzzed out the faces, but this is a general idea of what we saw... and those prominent 'stop' signs look quite dramatic! 

Evidently people were getting cash. If Cyprus switches to the Cyprus Pound, it will probably be devalued against the euro, meaning that hard currency euros are worth more, relatively speaking. Not that I'm a banker or any kind of economist.

What will happen?  I wouldn't want to hazard a guess.  One BBC correspondent has explained some of the difficult choices that must be made.  I don't think anyone wants Cyprus to leave the eurozone, or for the banking system to collapse entirely.  I remain cautiously optimistic that some solution will be found - that, at tonight's meeting, a compromise of some sort will be found. I'm a great believer in negotiation and finding mutually acceptable solutions to problems. In this case it's impossible to please everyone; money is such a divisive subject. 

In the meantime, I'm keeping half an eye on the live update feeds from both The Telegraph and The Guardian (two UK newspapers).  The final decision should be made at a meeting this evening.....

Maybe. 

Levy on savings in Cyprus banks... Eurozone bailout?

I don't switch my computer on until after my walk, if  have one, and any necessary shopping or housework, and breakfast, and a shower... so it wasn't until about ten o'clock this morning that I sat down to check my email, and Facebook, and also the news.  Not that I'm a great one for world events, or politics.. I tend more towards human interest stories, on the whole.

But this morning, this story about Cyprus and the Eurozone bailout leapt out at me when I looked at the BBC news site. I don't begin to understand economics, but am aware that Cyprus is in huge debt - not entirely the island's fault - and that with the new government, elected recently, there was likely to be a big bailout package agreed. This appears to be the case, but according to the article 'savers' in banks - such as the Bank of Cyprus: 

Or the Laiki Bank:

are going to be subject to a one-off 'tax'.  Those with more than 100,000 euro in their accounts will have to pay almost 10%, which is rather a large amount of money at that level, and those with less will  have to pay 6.75%.  Moreover, to stop people transferring all their money out, or withdrawing it, all electronic banking is on hold for this (Carnival) weekend. Monday is a public holiday for Green Monday, and the levy will be imposed, I gather, on Tuesday morning. 

I was not clear whether this 'tax' applies just to savings accounts - in which case, we will be charged about €14 - or to current accounts, in which case it will be a bit more - but still not a great deal. We don't tend to keep much in our Cyprus account; we just transfer what we need each month from the UK. 

Having read the story at the BBC site, I then looked at the Cyprus Mail, the other place where I tend to glance at news each morning. Savers are forced to bear costs, the headline proclaimed.  The story is similar, and, again, no indication whether it's just savings (although that is perhaps implied) or all accounts.  There is a lengthy and somewhat angry comment thread at the end of that article, unsurprisingly.  It does seem like an odd thing, legally speaking, to be able to deduct money from ordinary people with no warning whatsoever. However, if the alternative was for the banks to become bankrupt and lose everything, it's certainly a lesser problem. 

I am surprised to learn that apparently about half the Cyprus savers are non-resident Russians, who will be contributing a large amount of this 'tax'.  Perhaps there are also ex-pats living here who have seen Cyprus as a tax haven - rates are low.  But there must also be people who have been saving carefully and frugally over the years, only to find that they lose a significant amount, out of the blue. Then there are small businesses, or organisations such as Richard's, who struggle to keep afloat, and who will be hit very hard indeed by this. 

Clearly it's a news story which will run for a while - other Eurozone countries are going to be worried, and if this tax is legal it's going to make a lot of people give up on banks, or withdraw all their savings, which - I would have thought - would make it still worse. 

Later news stories have reported incredulity giving way to fury in Cyprus, and shock as savers wake up to the levy.  The BBC is also reporting individual stories about the bailout. 

What mystifies me is that the reports say that levying this 'tax' is going to raise 6 billion euros.  That's a LOT of money. And since the majority is apparently going to come from people at the higher threshold, that means that 6 billion is only 10% of what is currently deposited in the banks.  

So... why are the banks supposed to be in crisis?  

Brief visit to Potamos

Another year has rolled by, accounting-wise, and our accountant friend has come out to stay for another week to work on Fixed Assets and Year-End and other such essentials for Richard's work.  While she's here, we usually try to take her somewhere that she hasn't been before.  Last year we went to Agia Napa, for instance.  Four years ago - hard to believe it's so long ago! - we spent a day in Limassol, visiting Kurium and Kolossi Castle.

This time, we decided to go out on Sunday afternoon, and our friend suggested Potamos, a fishing village highly recommended by one of the tourist books. It's somewhere I had never been in our fifteen years, although I have heard others talk about it. Richard has been there a few times, but only by boat. Apparently it's about thirty nautical miles by sea to Potamos from Larnaka, so a good destination for a day sail in the dinghy.

It was apparently 46km by road which is about 28 miles, and took us half an hour or so to reach. I had little idea what to expect. The word 'Potamos' in Greek just means 'river', but Richard told us that it was just a little inlet of salt water where fishing boats stay. Our first sight of the bay was this:

It was a pleasant afternoon; sunny, but only around 16C. We decided to walk along the beach first of all. Although there were one or two people with barbecues, it was mostly deserted: 

The water was extremely clear, with gentle rock pools and some seaweed floating around, although clear water is pretty much impossible to show in a photograph:

There's very little tide in Cyprus, so the sand was soft making it hard to walk in places. Where we could, we walked on damper sand; in other places we walked along a rough path.  As in Larnaka, there are yellow wildflowers just about everywhere:

Of course, nowhere is a true idyll. I was quite shocked to see quite a bit of litter lying around, some of it looking quite recent:

Other litter had evidently been caught up in the foliage:

There was some slightly larger litter too, which would be rather more difficult to remove:

Or perhaps that's what happens when waiting... and waiting... for a bus.

As we walked back, we passed a very busy fish restaurant, and saw some prickly pears growing wild:

We didn't even consider picking them, however! We would have needed rather strong gloves. 

Many of the fishing boats looked old and tired, and the walkways over the sand decidedly ramshackle:

I think this pretty much sums up the relaxed attitude to the law that's prevalent in Cyprus (you can click the photo to make it bigger - but in case it still isn't clear, the white squarish sign surrounded by parked vehicles says 'NO PARKING':

I loved the reflections made by this boat, which looked a bit cleaner and brighter than many:

Before long we reached the end of the water, and saw what must once have been a hotel of some kind:

We all shuddered a bit at the thought of the metal bridge that gave access from the other side!

While I'm not surprised that an old hotel would still be standing, albeit abandoned, I did wonder quite how this hut continued to stay upright:

As we returned to the car, I looked out over a landscape which was green enough that it could almost have been a roadside in the UK:

.. except that, moving a little to one side, there was yet more large-size 'litter' in the form of ancient rusty boat trailers:

It was a pleasant enough place to go for a walk, and on a warm day the beach might have been quite fun for children. But the sea was too rocky to be much use for swimming, and there wasn't really a whole lot to see.  We've been here fifteen years now, and this is my first visit. I don't think I've missed out on anything.

Still, as a typical example of an old-style fishing 'village', Potamos is perhaps worth a visit for an eager tourist wanting to see traditional Cyprus.