Colourful and inexpensive fruit and veg in Cyprus

It's been a while since I wrote. We've had a very cold spell in Cyprus and, more recently, an unseasonably warm few days. We've had work done on the house, which means there's a lot of cleaning and some repainting to do next week before our next visitors.

There is a great deal that I could write about, and perhaps I will in the next few weeks.  But on Friday, Richard was out for the morning so I did my weekly shopping on foot, using my trolley to transport food home. The main part of what I bought - indeed, the main part of what we eat - was fruit and vegetables.

As I brought it all in, and started unpacking, I realised again what good value fruit and veg are in Cyprus. They're mostly fresh, they taste extremely good, and there are usually slightly older items on sale at even better value than normal.

So here's what I bought on Friday:

Some of the carrots, cauliflower, peppers and courgettes were to take to a shared meal on Friday evening. But other than that, I was only buying for the two of us for the weekend (three on Sunday), and a couple of days next week; I'll buy some more fruit and veg on Wednesday.

We already had some oranges, cucumbers, tomatoes and mushrooms, and also garlic, so I didn't need any of those; just as well, as my trolley was very full, even though, laid out like this, it doesn't look like a lot for five days. We needed some lemons, too, but our good friends have a prolific lemon tree so they gave us a couple of dozen of them this morning.

I've been so long out of the UK that I have no idea what this amount of fruit and veg would cost there. They're not organic - but they're unwaxed, loose, and - mostly - locally grown.  I had thought this would be around €15-18 and was pleased that the total was slightly less than €13.50.  That's about £10.50 in the UK by today's exchange rate (or just over $19 in the US).

Oh, and for those who are concerned about the environment, I did get a lot of small plastic bags (more than are shown in the picture) but I re-use them for cat litter, so they're not wasted. The shop has a system whereby pink bags are the special offer items, green (though they look turquoise in the photo) are the main ones, and the final aisle are blue. Not using bags would make everything more complicated for the checkout people - and I do take my own larger cloth bags to pack them in.

Changing my mobile phone provider

It's seven years since I first had a mobile phone. Five years ago I wrote about topping it up annually, having to buy a €10 card, since the €5 cards only lasted for 30 days. Normal users of mobiles would think nothing of this, but at the time I struggled to spend as much as €10 in a year.

I eventually had to replace my original Sony phone; it still worked, but the battery life was almost non-existent. When I discovered that a basic Samsung phone in the UK would cost me £10 (unlocked) about three years ago it wasn't a difficult decision to make. Admittedly it took me a few days to get used to it, but I like the predictive text feature; it's light, and simple and - as with my first one - I can make phone calls and send texts.

Oh, and it tells me the time and occasionally acts as an alarm clock.

I have no wish for anything more advanced. I have continued with my pay-as-you-go contract from MTN and had no problems.

Last May, I was pleased to find that I could buy a €5 top-up card from MTN which would last me a year.  I had succeeded in getting my credit to less than €20 and wondered if I might actually succeed in running it down to nothing - after all, I send a minimum of three texts per week (when arranging morning walks) and often as many as ten. I just checked my call log, and it appears that I have made twenty actual phone calls in the past two months. Some of them as long as thirty seconds.

Last Summer, when Tim tried to top up his MTN pay-as-you-go phone, he was annoyed to find that a €10 card was only valid for 60 days. He thought it was because he bought it online - but then learned that they had changed their policies. A €20 top-up was the same - only valid for 60 days. Apparently they don't want light users any more. So, since we had a 'spare' contract (a long story) Tim took that over a few months ago.  Including the monthly charge (85c) he seems to spend about €2-3 per month - and he uses his mobile a lot more than I use mine.

The end of my last year's validity period was fast approaching. I went into an MTN shop to check that this really was the case - that I could no longer pay a small amount that would last a year. The girl in the shop confirmed it, and when I said I'd have to switch providers, she shrugged and nodded.

So it's a nice irony, really. Having moved our landline from CYTA to Cablenet last month, I'm about to move my mobile phone from MTN to CYTA. I double-checked, and their top-ups are far more reasonable: €5 last a year.

I knew I would have to buy a new Sim card, and thought that might cost me ten or fifteen euros... so when I popped into the CYTA shop last Friday, I was surprised to see this:

I told the cashier I would like a new pay-as-you go Sim, and she handed me the pack. Not only was it cheaper than I expected, it included €5 of credit. It's only valid for 90 days, but that's fine; I have 100 free texts included, too. 

Evidently I looked somewhat incompetent, as the cashier asked me (very nicely) if I knew how to activate the Sim. I told her that I didn't, but my son would help me. I'm sure she could have done it for me but I didn't actually want to start it until a couple of days before the end of my current validity period with MTN (which STILL has €12 on it, although I am trying hard to use it up).

I opened it up when I got home:

I assume everything is there. I will need to activate it (or, rather, have someone in the family activate it for me) within the next few days, because it occurs to me that my mobile number is used as a security measure for our online banking, and various other online services. In order to switch to a new number I will have to receive and validate a code on my current number.  Happily my original Sony phone is still usable (so long as it's plugged into the charger continually) so that seems like a good place to put my MTN Sim for the last few days of its life.

Achna fruit stall, revisited...

Although good friends with abundant lemon trees have been generous in giving us bags of lemons over the past few months, we were just about running out. With our colds and coughs we have been drinking a lot of hot honey and lemon, and I had frozen lots of 'lemon cubes' in ice cube trays, for times when we need just a tablespoon or two of lemon juice and don't have a fresh one handy. 

Richard had almost finished the last bottle of our current batch of lemonade, and although I had frozen some peel and juice, I wanted to keep that for the summer. 

So we took the car to the fruit stall where crates of produce are on offer for low prices.  

We bought 4kg oranges (enough for early morning juice for the next week or so):

3kg potatoes (which should last us a couple of weeks at least):

6kg lemons (which made 3 litres of lemonade, and 48 'lemon cubes', and still left about ten lemons for hot drinks):

3kg bananas (I dehydrated 20 of them on Saturday, as we very much like dried bananas):

and 3kg carrots (which will probably also last us about two weeks):

While I doubt if any of this produce is organic, the fruit is certainly unwaxed and it's all likely to be locally grown.  

The price of the 19kg fruit and veg which we bought? 

 €10. Total. 

(For British and American readers, according to Google that's £8.63 in sterling, or $13 US)

It's not as great value as the fruit we bought there in the Autumn, but it seems pretty reasonable to me. 

Some things are very expensive in Cyprus, but I'm happy that great quality fruit and vegetables are still very affordable. 

Gas central heating in Cyprus

I'm pretty sure this past month has been rather warmer than usual, despite it beginning to feel a bit chilly. Last year, after a great deal of rain, we had started using our central heating by the middle of November, as we had during 2009. But in 2010, winter didn't really start until a week into December. [What a good thing I keep a blog, since there is no way I would have remembered any of these dates!]

Unlike at our old house, where we had small gas canisters that we had to change ourselves when they ran out - usually every three weeks, although they were only used for cooking - we have a large, static one here.  It's nearly as tall as I am:

During the winter months, a guy in a large truck comes around and fills it up, usually once a fortnight. He waits until the weather starts to get cold - and this year,  he didn't arrive for the first time until a few days ago. 

I'm not entirely sure how he managed to get through to the gas canister with the pipe that attaches to it, as there are rather a lot of Richard's tools and also some junk sitting in the way: 

But somehow he managed it. And charged me a little over €140, which is, I suppose, the gas we have used for cooking since March when he last came. For nine months of gas, that's not bad. 

Unfortunately, the central heating, once we switch it on, will use up a great deal of gas, no matter how much we try to economise. We usually run it at around 16-18C, which is why we haven't needed it yet as the indoor temperatures are still about 19-20C.  I'm sitting here in a sweatshirt and a fleece, and it's not really cold. Not yet. 

Our house is equipped with radiators in every room:

.. and there's a boiler system in a shed next to the gas canister, which Richard will need to service before we switch the heating on. He plans to do that at some point over the weekend.

[I was going to write an introduction to this post explaining how we were quite surprised to find that we needed central heating at all in Cyprus, but in looking back at other posts I made on the topic, I found that I wrote all about why we need warm duvets and heating, five years ago. Almost to the day.]

Empty shops in Cyprus

I'm no economist, but it's pretty clear that small businesses in Cyprus are suffering.  For the past year or so, we've seen empty shops along some of the main streets, where there used to be thriving businesses. It's not unusual for shops to change hands, but in the fifteen years since we came here, this is the first time we've seen increasing numbers of former shops just standing empty.

More recently this has started happening locally, to small shops which used to serve the neighbouring houses.  On my return from a recent early morning walk I decided to photograph some of them. I saw this one:

And this one:

As I approached our favourite Achna froutaria (which is still thriving, thankfully) I also remembered this one, a former take-away food place, which has been empty for some months now:

Next door stood this: a mini-market which changed hands perhaps nine months ago, but has evidently been in its last throes for a while now, selling off random products at very cheap prices.  It's now closed down entirely:

What actually first triggered my surprise about the number of empty shops locally was seeing that the small froutaria, just a couple of streets away from us, had closed a couple of weeks ago. That was quite a shock, as it always seemed to get a fair bit of custom; I didn't use it myself, most of the time, as I like Achna so much better - but just occasionally I would pop there for something quick.

However, by the time I got around to taking a photo, someone else had taken over the building. It looks like another mini-market, although it's hard to tell:

Reports in the Cyprus Mail suggest that more and more families are now struggling to survive in Cyprus,  Some are going without electricity for weeks at a time, and relying on charitable organisations for clothing and food. Benefits/welfare are not easy to get here, and the system was undoubtedly flawed, but recent reforms have made it even more difficult for those struggling the most.  Another report stated that, as in the rest of Europe, around 16% of the population are living below the official poverty line, which is a little over €10,000 per year.  

Cyprus used to be an inexpensive, friendly place to live. Electronic and other luxury goods were expensive compared to the UK or the US, but the basic cost of living was low, and it was entirely possible to live economically on around that level, particularly for those (the majority of Cypriots) who own their own home, and are thus not paying any rent.

But electricity and other utility costs have skyrocketed, and while fruit and vegetables are still good value in season, other food and grocery items have become far more expensive, to the extent that when we visit the UK we're now surprised at how cheap everything looks - rather the reverse of the situation ten years ago.  Even petrol costs have risen, so that from being one of the cheapest in Europe, Cyprus petrol is now almost as expensive as the highly-taxed fuel in the UK. 

We hear of ex-pats, often retirees, being forced to return to their own countries as it's too expensive to live here now.  There are still wealthy tourists from Eastern Europe, and some from the UK and other Western European countries who can afford to pay the extra for guaranteed sunshine and relative safety. But it's no longer a good value holiday place, and unless something changes, it's going to spiral downhill faster and faster.

Thus ends the nearest to a political post that I'm ever likely to write... 

Medical insurance in Cyprus

Anyone stumbling on my post, a week ago, about our upcoming immigration appointment might be vaguely wondering what we did about the requirement for full medical insurance.

Indeed, depending on your viewpoint, you might be wondering why we do not already have full medical insurance in Cyprus, or - at the other extreme - why, as British citizens, we need anything at all other than the European health card.

To answer the second part: we moved here before Britain was in the EU, and before the EHIC was invented. And although, due to the nature of Richard's work here, we are still entitled to free health care under the NHS while in the UK, we have been here far too long to qualify for a European health card.

When we first moved here, we were advised to have insurance with a company whom our colleagues at the time used and recommended. It seemed reasonable value, the excess (ie the part we agreed to pay for any medical expense) was fifty pounds sterling per incident, and those who used the company had been pleased with the speed of pay-outs when needed.

However, despite the fact that we never claimed anything at all - I think in our first couple of years we had, perhaps, two doctor visits, for which we simply paid the standard fifteen Cyprus pounds - the premiums started going up significantly. At the end of 1999, Daniel fractured his wrist and we thought that, finally, we might get something back from our medical insurance. But despite three visits to the orthopedic surgeon, a plaster cast and two x-rays the entire cost did not reach our excess.

So, after much research and discussion with local friends, we spoke to our household insurance broker who put us in touch with his recommended medical insurance guy. He came to our house and gave us a quotation for several possible options. Taking everything into account, he suggested we take out just major medical coverage - so that it would kick in if we needed to stay in hospital, but not for any out-patient or regular doctor visits. It was much better value, and so we opted for that, with an excess of 200 Cyprus pounds.

Ten or more years later, the premiums reduced as our sons left home, but then went gone up as we got older.  And we still haven't made any claims. I don't recall the last time either of us visited a doctor, let alone anything more serious.

But for Immigration now, we are required to have not just major medical coverage, but out-patient coverage too. This is new - it wasn't a requirement at all when we first moved here. However, looking at the regulations, it seemed that we might be eligible for the Cyprus 'pink medical card' which would entitle us to free health care.

So on Thursday, we went to the Old Hospital, not far from where we live, as instructed by one of the relevant websites.  The Old Hospital is busy, teeming with activity, and we had no idea where to go. So we went to a likely looking reception area, and were pointed to a different building.

We went to the other building, queued for a few moments, and spoke to another receptionist. Oh no, we were told. These cards are not done at the Old Hospital any more, but at the government building opposite Carrefour.

We went to the Land Registry office last week, to get copies of our deeds. So we assumed that was the building opposite Carrefour to which they were referring. We went there... and were told that no, it was the building next-door.

So finally we reached our destination. I sat down - my injured foot was beginning to ache by then - and Richard had a long conversation with a receptionist who phoned several people to ask questions.

It seems that we are not, after all, eligible for a pink card. At least, not currently. If we were receiving a UK state pension, then we would be. Alternatively, if we were working here and paying Cyprus social insurance contributions, then we would be. But although we own a house, and are still eligible for NHS treatment, we somehow fall into the category of 'non-active' Europeans, which will not give us free insurance.

Ah well. It was worth trying.

On the way out, Richard had a phone call, and in the course of conversation mentioned what we'd been trying to do. The friend suggested speaking to our friendly car rental man, who also has a business in insurance. We know him, and trust him, and he would get us the best deal.

So Richard went to talk to him, and signed us both up for a year's basic medical insurance, not including any huge expenses but pretty much anything else... and that, apparently, is all that's required for Immigration.

It seems crazy to us that they want proof of out-patient and low-cost coverage, and don't actually need us to have any major medical insurance... but, this is Cyprus!

A small, Cyprus-style warehouse with flour and nuts

On our way back from Agia Napa last week, I saw that we would be driving very near to a warehouse which friends had suggested we might visit. They found it recently on the recommendation of other friends... this is how many things work in Cyprus. We knew that it was a small place that didn't actually look like a warehouse, on a corner of the road where Sarris supermarket is.

We also knew that it was open to the public, and sold very good value nuts of various kinds as well as flour, dried fruit, and various other items. I was intrigued.

So we drove slowly along the road in question, looking at all the street corners, until we spotted it:

The name, according to the receipt I have, is (in English letters) Patroklos Chrysostomou Ltd.

It didn't look at all like a warehouse on the outside, but we quickly realised that there were two parts. First we went into a rather crowded small shop with some conveniently pre-bagged nuts, raisins, seeds, and so on, and also some places to scoop most of these items for oneself into bags, at a slightly better price.

I don't tend to remember prices very well, but had made a note of the best value almonds I had previously found (a little under 9 euros per kilogram at the froutaria) - and these were less still, with the locally grown ones at 6.75 euros per kilo - significantly less. Since we prefer to buy locally grown produce whenever we can, we bought some. We bought some cashews, walnuts and raisins too, also rather better value than we could buy elsewhere.

Then we wandered out into what appeared to be a garage at the back of the shop where there were large flour sacks on the floor, and various other items around. We didn't want to spend very long there - it was already after our usual lunch-time and I was feeling decidedly hungry - but I did ask if they had any wholewheat flour - what we saw all appeared to be white. One man told me in broken English that they were ALL whole wheat, but some of them had the 'shells' taken away. I suppose he meant that they didn't contain anything other than wheat, but even the one which he said still had the 'shells' in looked much whiter than our usual wholegrain flour.

Since the sight of flour sacks, open to the air (and thus potentially any insects...) wasn't all that appealing, and it's not as if we use THAT much flour anyway, we didn't investigate further. But I think we'll be returning to this place in the future...

Buying fruit in Cyprus

The cost of living in Cyprus is a lot higher than it used to be. But locally grown fruit is still excellent value, and great quality too. I like to pick up bargains, so I often pop down to Achna Froutaria first thing (well, about 7.30am) on a Saturday morning. I wanted some apples and oranges, primarily for juicing, so was very pleased to see that there were bags of them on the euro aisle. I looked quickly to check that none of them was obviously bad, and picked up one of each.

In the 'pink bag' (reduced, but not ready-bagged) section I spotted some Cyprus bananas - which taste so much better than imported ones, even if they go brown a little more quickly - and some figs.


When I arrived home, a little weighed down by my purchases, I put the euro-bags on the kitchen scales of out curiosity, and also checked the bill.

Rather neatly, I thought, I had managed to buy approximately:

3.5kg oranges
2.5kg apples
1.5kg bananas
0.5kg figs

That's 8kg in all - for a grand total of €3.70.

For those that prefer imperial measurements, 8kg is about 17.5 pounds weight. And for those who think in other currencies, €3.70 is approximately $5 (US dollars), or £3.20 in sterling.

It seems good value to me, anyway. And certainly both healthful and delicious.

Another post about supermarket shopping in Cyprus

Eight months ago I wrote about the new Lidl supermarkets in Cyprus, and how generally underwhelmed we were. Since then, advertising mail has continued to arrive, and been filed immediately in the recycling. In my attempt to become more health-conscious, 'green' and economical, I'm buying almost nothing that's pre-processed these days. I do the majority of my grocery shopping at the local Achna Froutaria, popping in also, perhaps once a week, to Achna Discount and/or Orphanides Express. All these shops are within easy walking distance of our home so I go on foot, as early as possible now that the weather is getting decidedly warmer.

But, about once a month, we have to do a bigger shop for things I can't buy locally, or can't carry home on foot. Cat litter, for instance, or washing powder (which I prefer to buy in bulk) or long-life milk, which I need for making yogurt. So we go to our favourite supermarket, Metro, in the car. We buy almost all our meat there, too, as it's good quality and the prices are usually reasonable. On Thursday evening I realised that we needed to do a big shop before too long, so we decided to go on Friday morning.

However... several of our friends have mentioned using Lidl, and finding bargains there. Over the months I suppose there's been something of a trickle effect in our minds. So, as we got in the car yesterday, Richard said, 'Shall we try Lidl first?'

I knew that long-life milk cost under a euro at Lidl, also sugar (which has recently shot up in price - the standard supermarket price appears to be 1.49 euros per kilogram). So I shrugged, and said yes, why not?

It didn't take as long to get there as I'd expected, and - no longer being new - the car park was fairly empty.


We found a trolley - using the key token thing we were given months ago - and made our way slowly around. I can't say I was over-impressed. There were vast quantities of junk food - fizzy drinks, pre-processed migraine-inducing packs of imported chemicals masquerading as food - and the fruit and vegetable section was small, expensive and generally unimpressive.

Still, we did find sugar (which I need in large quantities for jam-making currently) and long-life milk, and also good value white flour, though no wholemeal. We thought we would try some Lidl chocolate, too, as that seemed a good price. And we found some special offer kitchen roll. We looked at various other items but most of them seemed to be more expensive than we would pay elsewhere, or else not the kind we liked. I was pleased, however, to find some dried chick-peas, something I've been looking for (in vain) for a couple of months now.

So, it was worth going; we ended up with about thirty euros of groceries:


- which doesn't look like much in the trolley at all, despite being discounted prices!

Unfortunately, we still had to go to Metro:


Two shops in one day is not much fun... but at least we know our way around Metro. We spent about 45 minutes in Lidl - which isn't very big - just looking around and finding a few items; we were only 40 minutes in Metro. And still spent a couple of hundred euros:


And yes, it all fit in one trolley. Even a year ago we would have needed two trolleys for that amount of money.

The cost of living in Cyprus has gone up phenomenally in the last year or so. About seventy euros of that was meat for the next month, most of which went directly in the freezer, to be used in the crockpot. Being a vegetarian would be a lot cheaper. Nearly thirteen euros was Biokill insecticide, rather necessary for the summer season; nearly twenty euros was cat food and litter; fifteen was toilet rolls. But it's still a bit scary that a few other groceries - olive oil, mayonnaise (I haven't yet found a good recipe for that), tuna, eggs, milk, cheese and a few other bits can add up to so much. I didn't even buy any washing powder this time.

Holland and Barrett (UK) order to Cyprus...

When we're in the UK, I always visit Holland and Barrett at least once, sometimes more. (For those who don't know this chain, they're basically a health food shop). Their range and quality of vitamins and minerals is excellent, and although the prices can be on the high side, they have new special offers every week, and I take advantage of many of them.

They do an online ordering option, which I've used a couple of times to a UK address, when someone was coming out to see us. I've also, on rare occasions, ordered directly to Cyprus. The reason I haven't done that very often is that the postage was, in my view, ridiculously high. They charged £16.75 to deliver here, for any size of parcel. It was worth it when I wanted to order Vitamin C powder, which I stir into our fresh juice each morning. They charge around £18 for the odd amount of 567g, or just over half a kilogram of Vit C powder. The best price I found in Cyprus for something similar was over €20 for 100g. So even with the extortionate postage, it was worth making an order for that alone. But, obviously, better still to buy when we're in the UK.

Since I have ordered online, I get emails of special offers from Holland and Barrett now and again. I sometimes delete them unread, sometimes check to see if there's anything I want. Just before Christmas, they sent me an email offering me £10 off any online order for more than £30, which seemed like a very good deal. I had forgotten about it with all that goes on in December, until they sent me a reminder that it would expire in a few days.

So, in an idle moment, I browsed around the Holland and Barrett site. I knew I'd run out of lavender oil and was very low on tea tree oil, both of which are extremely expensive in Cyprus. But I didn't really want to spend $30 just on essential oil.

I was, therefore, rather pleased to see that they have started including nuts, seeds and dried fruit in their online options. And, at a quick glance, it seemed that they were very good value. I was even more pleased to see that they now also offer green tea and blackcurrant tea-bags online, since I haven't been able to get hold of any of those for a couple of months. Cyprus supermarkets do tend to run out of things from time to time, and I've been drinking green tea and raspberry instead, which I like almost as much.

So today, while it pours with rain outside, I decided to have a proper look at the site, compare prices with what I've bought here, and - perhaps - make an order taking account of the voucher.

My first and perhaps most exciting discovery is that postage to Cyprus is now a much more reasonable £6.95.

Almonds, I discovered, are a little more expensive from Holland and Barrett than the best prices I've found here. So I didn't order any of those.

But...

Flaxseeds (linseeds) which I add to bread are €2,39 for 250g from Metro; £1.54 for 500g from Holland and Barrett. Even given that a pound is worth a bit more than a euro, that is considerably better value. Sunflower seeds were not quite so significantly different, but still rather less: £2.19 for 500g at H&B compared to €1,79 for 250g at Metro. Dried apricots were cheaper too - slightly - and (I hope) free of additives. I did order some essential oils, some of which were on special offer this week, making them even better value, and a pack of green tea and blackcurrant, which is only 79p for 20 bags (compared to over two euros which I pay when they're available here). I was delighted to see Ricola cough lozenges now available to order online (oddly, searching for 'Ricola' does not produce any results, but I spotted them anyway, labelled as 'swiss herb drops'.

I saw bags of oats (oatmeal) too, £1.49 for a kilogram; the best bargain I've been able to find in Cyprus is €1.00 for 500g - and not always available. I have a couple of bags in the freezer, and only really use them for granola, which I make about once a month, so I didn't order any this time. My Holland and Barrett order had reached £30, and I can see myself using this facility regularly now the postage is so much more reasonable. With the £10 discount, my entire order - including postage - came to just over £27. For items that, in Cyprus, would have cost me nearly €50.

I suppose this shows just how the cost of living in Cyprus has risen in the past few years. Although vitamins and minerals have always been expensive here, food in general used to be reasonably good value. And I don't think of Holland and Barrett as particularly cheap compared to other UK shops.

My order will probably take a couple of weeks to arrive, but assuming it's in good condition (and assuming the Post Office doesn't try to charge me anything for receiving foods here) I shall definitely be ordering online from Holland and Barrett again.

A Little Lidl...

So, Lidl opened just outside Larnaka, a couple of weeks ago. I'm told there are two new stores: one in Aradippou, the other somewhere along the Dhekelia Road.

Since receiving the gift pack, we've seen several glossy advertising brochures for Lidl in our mailbox. I glanced through them, but couldn't see anything particularly appealing. I was glad that we now have paper recycling in Cyprus, since there have been a vast number of advertising brochures recently.

A few of our friends have already visited Lidl. I gather that there was chaos on the first couple of days, when there were special 'opening offers', but - of course - nowhere near sufficient to meet the demand. I heard that some of the products are very good value, even when not on special offer. But for just two of us, it somehow didn't seem worth bothering with the extra distance.

This morning, we had two shops to visit before Richard went to the office. We both really need new trainers [US: sneakers], and we also had a few items to buy at Metro. In particular, a kind of cat litter we haven't found anywhere else, and Richard's favourite ground coffee, which isn't available at the local supermarkets. It's three weeks since we did a 'major' grocery shop at Metro, which is usually once a month, and I only had about half a dozen things on my list... but it seemed a good idea to go today, anyway, and then perhaps wait another three or four weeks before doing a major shopping expedition prior to Christmas.

On the way out of the house, I saw yet more advertising brochures in our mailbox. I grabbed them to glance at in the car. They were both from Lidl, who must have spent a fortune on advertising. One of them was for food items, but the other made it look rather more interesting:


I had not realised they had such a big non-food section, but this brochure ran to several pages:


I commented that we'd probably do well to stay away from Lidl, since it looked as if it might be the kind of place where we'd spot all kinds of 'bargains' that we hadn't realised we needed.. then I noticed that they had men's trainers on offer. When I mentioned that, Richard suggested we take a look...

It was a little further away than I'd expected - past Kleima by quite a way, but it was easy enough to find:


I had brought with me the blue keyring that came in our free bag, since, as several people kindly pointed out to me, there is a removable plastic circle which can be used in lieu of a euro to get a trolley. I was eager to try it out, but Richard suggested we have a look first, since we might not be buying anything.

Inside, it looked much like the two British Lidl stores I've seen. The non-food part was, disappointingly, just a series of boxes down the middle. The quality didn't look as great as the advertising suggested, and the shoes looked much too narrow for Richard. I couldn't find most of the products from the brochure at all. Perhaps they'd already been bought.

Flour (plain white all-purpose) and sugar (white) were at very good prices - 49c, which is around half the regular price. Had we needed any, I would have bought some. I did see one man with an entire trolley full of flour - perhaps he was going to sell it somewhere else. Or make a lot of cakes. But I had plenty of flour and sugar at home, and we don't get through that much with just two of us, so we didn't buy any.

I did see chicken breast at about a euro per kilogram cheaper than we usually get it. I was tempted... but if we'd bought that, we would have had to go home to put it in the freezer before going out to do our other shopping, so I didn't. They didn't have the coffee we wanted - indeed, it was hard to find any coffee - nor the cat litter.

I'm glad we had a look around, to appease our curiosity, but we were both underwhelmed, and didn't - in the end - buy anything at Lidl.

So then we drove to the ShoeBox (previously Shoe Emporium) where we've bought good value trainers in the past. No such luck this time. Cypriots (other than children) don't seem to wear trainers much and there's nothing like the selection we can find in the UK. We'll have to look in town, I suppose.

Then on to Metro. Four bags of cat litter, two of coffee. A couple of large bags of cat food. We found a few items on two-for-one special offer - things which keep, and which we would buy - so put those in the trolley too. And I was particularly pleased to find chicken breast on extra-special offer, a euro LESS than the price at Lidl, so bought several packs of that for the freezer.

Despite it not being a 'major' shop, we spent just over a hundred euros at Metro. Living in Cyprus is a great deal more expensive than it used to be, which I suppose is why so many people are excited about Lidl opening. If we lived nearer, I would probably go there for sugar and flour when I needed them, but it isn't worth the extra petrol.

Three large shops in one day. Sigh. That's more than I like to see in a month.

A productive weekend, courtesy of the Froutaria special offers

I mentioned - when writing recently about making and freezing raw apple sauce - that I have determined to make more use of the special offer pre-bagged produce at a euro per bag at our local froutaria.

On Friday last week, I went there and spotted a bag of lemons. They looked rather grubby and spotty - perhaps even windfalls - but as far as I could tell, they were locally grown ones. I hadn't made any lemonade since just before Tim arrived, early August, and Richard very much likes my home made lemon squash.

So I carried home a bag of lemons, along with other produce I wanted, and when I weighed them, discovered that I had bought over two and a half kilogrammes:


They were distinctly dirty...


But I scrubbed them well, particularly the ones I was using for peel. As they were small, and rather hard, they weren't all that juicy; it took 25 of them to make a litre of juice. But I got my three bottles of lemonade to put in the fridge, which should last a couple of weeks, probably:


Cost: approximately two euros (a little less than one bag of lemons, one kilogramme of sugar, and some cooking time).

I actually made the lemonade on Saturday morning, after I'd popped to the froutaria again. This time, the one-euro shelf was piled high with produce. I immediately decided on two bags of tomatoes:


- which turned out to be about 7kg in all when I weighed them. I also bought another bag of apples - big ones, this time - although I hadn't quite decided what to do with them. With the other fruit and veg I wanted, I was quite weighed down on the walk home.

Still, despite continued high temperatures, I was feeling quite energetic. So while the lemonade was simmering, I chose about two and a half kilogrammes of the slightly better tomatoes, and popped them, a few at a time, in boiling water until they had softened. The first time I prepared chopped tomatoes for the freezer (to replace canned chopped tomatoes, which are expensive in Cyprus, and apparently not very good for us as the tomato juice reacts with the inner coating on the cans) I carefully skinned them all after blanching. It was time-consuming, and seemed like rather a waste.

The second time, I left the skins on when I chopped them... and they were just fine when used in lasagnes or casseroles or soups. I still do the blanching, because it helps the juice to be released as I chop the tomatoes, but it's a great deal quicker not having to skin them.

The result of this was six 450g containers of chopped tomatoes in their juice to be put in the freezer:


As for the remaining tomatoes (more than 4kg of them) I had decided to make passata - thick tomato puree - which I also planned to freeze. I found many recipes online, some of them suggesting that the tomatoes be roasted first, most of them recommending that chopped onions and garlic be gently fried in olive oil before adding the tomatoes (roasted or raw). There were many variations on the theme, so I thought I'd begin with as simple a recipe as possible. I had a very large onion, so I chopped that and gently stir-fried it. Then I cut up about eight or nine smallish garlic cloves - too small to be worth roasting whole. But no point crushing, since they were going to be put in the blender anyway. I threw in about a tablespoon of basil, as I think it goes well with tomatoes. Then I roughly chopped all the remaining tomatoes, and added them, a few at a time, stirring as I did. My largest saucepan was fairly full by the time I'd put them all in:


Then I left them to simmer, stirring now and again. The recipes I'd found online gave different times for this process, but all agreed that the contents of the pan should be softened and reduced. A bit like preparing fruit for jam, apparently.

After about an hour, the contents all felt soft, and were somewhat reduced, although not as much as I had expected. I was also a little surprised to see that the colour now looked more like tomato soup than passata from packets:


It even tasted rather like tomato soup, although I hadn't added any stock, or flour, or any of the other tomato soup ingredients. So I've no idea how well it will work as passata. I went ahead and blended it in the liquidizer in smallish quantities, after it had cooled down a little, and found myself with fifteen 250g containers of pureed tomato mixture:


So they, too, had to be cooled, labelled and frozen.

By that time - late Saturday morning - I'd had enough of cooking, and I planned to use my bag of apples for dessert the following day, anyway, when we were expecting our friends for a cold evening meal.

I weighed the apples on Sunday morning, early, and found there were nearly three kilogrammes.


I kept a couple of the nicer-looking ones for eating or juicing, and browsed through some recipes. I decided to try some apple pies. I discovered that pies with pastry on top only are the English style of pie, while the sort we call double-crust pies (with pastry at the bottom as well) are more normal in America. The pies with pastry at the bottom and not at the top (such as pecan pie or lemon meringue) are technically tarts.

I also discovered a packet of frozen blackberries in the freezer. Commercial ones, which were probably well past their sell-by date and probably bought by mistake when I wanted a few frozen raspberries for smoothies. (Neither fresh raspberries nor fresh blackberries are available in Cyprus, other than in tiny quantities at extortionate cost for a few weeks of the year). So I thought I'd make one basic apple pie, and two smaller apple-and-blackberry pies.

Unlike crumbles, the fruit doesn't need to be pre-cooked for apple pies, so I peeled and chopped five, to fit in my larger pie dish, sprinkling with brown sugar (less than any of my recipes asked for, as these were not cooking apples) and a little cinnamon:


Then I cut up another three for each of the smaller pie dishes, and divided the frozen blackberries between them, sprinkling sugar on top:


I then made shortcrust pastry, using half whole-wheat flour as I usually do, and was pleased that I'd estimated almost exactly the right amount for topping these three pies, with just a few scraps left to decorate them:


I then even remembered to brush them all with egg before cooking, and was rather pleased with the result:


The consensus on Sunday evening was that they were good, although the blackberries didn't really affect the taste at all. Perhaps they really were too old to have used, although they didn't do any harm.

We didn't even start the second of the blackberry-and-apple pies, so I put it in the freezer for some future occasion.

Yesterday morning I went to the froutaria for various bits and pieces, and there was nothing on the one-euro pre-bagged shelves other than pickling onions. Not something I use - so I didn't get any special offers. Just as well, really, because despite my burst of enthusiasm for working in the kitchen at the weekend, I feel less energetic this week and am glad not to have to do any more preparation. I shall probably feel better when the weather starts to become more autumnal, which must surely be some time soon...

Time to top up my Cyprus mobile phone again

About a year ago, I wrote about my mobile phone. I'd had to top it up with another ten euros, or risk losing the 29 euros of credit that I still had on it.

This week I had a text reminder that I needed to top up again. Fair enough - this time I knew where to buy another MTN card, and forked out another ten euros.

Then, before actually doing the top-up, I checked my credit balance. I've used the phone a fair bit (for me) this year... I've sent, probably about 20 texts per month, including the times when we were on 'roaming' in the UK. I've made sure that when I call Richard to remind him to come home for a meal, I use my mobile rather than the house phone. So I thought I might be down to my last few euros.

Imagine my surprise when I was told that I had 29.44 euros of credit.

That means that in the past year, using my phone has cost me slightly less than ten euros.

I know I don't chat for hours on the phone - I really don't like mobiles much - but I was sure I'd used it more than ever before in this last year. Evidently not.

Telephony is one thing that is still exceedingly good value in Cyprus.

Shopping at Metro in Cyprus

We hadn't done a 'big' shopping trip for a month. Admittedly we did two in December: one where we spent a huge amount of money, early in the month, and one the day before Christmas Eve, when we basically went to collect our turkey and sausagemeat,and ended up buying rather more than intended. We did have to ensure we had food not just for Christmas Day, but for the weekend afterwards, and perhaps even the Monday which was the official Boxing Day holiday... but even so. December was an expensive month, grocery-wise.

For the past four weeks, I've popped into the local froutaria, and the local small supermarket, Orphanides Express when I've needed anything. Plus the occasional foray into a bakery for milk. I go on foot, so am limited to perhaps a couple of carrier bags of shopping. I use a wire carry-basket to collect what I need, and - since I don't want too much to carry home - it's fairly rare that I buy anything other than what I went out to get. Unless there's a very special offer on something which I'm going to need anyway, of course, and if I have room for it.

But once again we were running low on frozen portions of meals, and also cat litter. I could, of course, buy fairly small bags of cat litter from Orphanides Express, but we prefer the large 16kg bags from Metro, which are considerably better value. However, we have to go by car to buy one of those. As for meat: several people over the years have commented that Metro has by far the best meat. It's certainly better value than Orphanides Express, and much easier to find what we want.

So we decided to go this morning. I jotted down a few other bits and pieces that we needed - to save me a couple of trips locally - but didn't expect to buy a huge amount of shopping.

The trouble with Metro is, it's a nicely organised supermarket, and while I don't like shops in general, it's a lot better than most. if I go to one of the really big supermarkets, I've had enough after about fifteen minutes, so rush to get out as fast as possible. I'm much more inclined to browse at Metro.

Then there are the special offers, temptingly placed on low shelving as you go in. I'm quite good at avoiding bargains that we really don't want or need. But when I saw our favourite Arial washing powder, 4kg size, reduced from 12.99 to 8.99 euros, I picked up a bag. Even though the current one will last us at least another six weeks. Then we saw Heinz tomato ketchup in squeezy bottles, reduced by a euro, making it less expensive than the usual DF brand we buy. I picked up a couple... then a third...even though we didn't actually need any ketchup just yet. But we will, sooner or later.

We had a look upstairs too, just because we find it interesting to see what will be in stock. While we were there, we remembered that I needed some new lightbulbs in my study. Europe, of course, is phasing out all the old style lightbulbs so the only ones now available are the energy-saving ones... in quite small sizes, with 'warm' light, but at about ten times the cost of an old style bulb. I have a ceiling fan in the study with three bulbs underneath that can be used one, two or three at a time... so Richard thought we'd better buy three bulbs, so that they would match, even though only two of them needed replacing. So that was another 15 euros I didn't expect to spend. Then we saw the computer supplies, and I remembered that we needed some blank DVDs for backing up photos... and of course the best value, by far, were in racks of 25. Which should last us a couple of years, at least.

We did buy the meat, and the cat litter, and all the things I'd jotted on my list. I wasn't going to get any fruit and veg, other than - perhaps - some oranges and pears, and maybe some potatoes and onions. But then I saw the special offer places were piled high with bags of fruit or veg at either one euro, or 1.70 euros... in very good condition. Including the oranges and pears that I wanted anyway. So we bought a kilogram bag of broccoli, one of bell peppers, and one of mushrooms, and also a 2kg bag of carrots.

The trolley was much fuller than I had expected. Thankfully the bill was not as huge as the ones in December. Excluding the light bulbs and DVDs, it was about 180 euros, which I suppose isn't too bad for a month's supply of most groceries including all the meat.

When we got home, I decided it would be best to deal with the bulk veggies immediately. I knew if I put them in the fridge, I would forget about them... So I washed them all, peeled the carrots, chopped everything, blanched the broccoli, and have now frozen a large number of two-portion bags of mushrooms, carrot sticks, broccoli and peppers.

So that was my morning.

I was glad I didn't have to go out anywhere, since it started raining as we finished bringing the shopping into the house, and has barely stopped since.

Rain in Cyprus

So, after a couple of weeks of wall-to-wall sunshine, and unseasonably warm temperatures, we had some rain yesterday. Half an hour or so late morning - quite heavy - and some light rain in the evening. That was fine: we do need the rain, after all.

This morning, we woke up to more rain. We were up in good time, and by about 8am the rain seemed to have stopped, though it was still rather grey. Richard hoped to start painting King Malu today, so we decided to do our big monthly shop at Metro supermarket, first thing.

We spent a horrendous amount of money for one - admittedly very full - trolley of groceries. There weren't even many fruit and vegetables, since I get most of those at the local Froutaria. We picked up three bags of the slightly older apples, oranges and carrots which were on special offer, but no more. I did buy quite a bit of meat - chicken breast was on special offer, and we also bought some stewing steak, mince, and boneless chicken thighs... my supply of frozen meals is running low so I need to make some more slow-cooked dishes.

Then there were the 'staples', which tend to be pricey in Cyprus. Dishwasher powder and salt, cat food, canned tomatoes and baked beans, frozen peas, coffee, molasses, several kilogrammes of flour, sugar, and so on. I bought some pineapple juice, rice milk and Weetabix since Tim will be home for Christmas in about ten days. Yes, this is - I hope - basically sufficient groceries for the next month, at least, other than the things I buy locally. Oh, and the turkey which we've ordered, and the cranberries which I hope will be available in another couple of weeks.

But still, adding up the amount mentally as the items went through the till was a bit shocking; the bill was in fact slightly less than I had estimated, but still more than I can ever remember spending before in one supermarket visit.

Perhaps it's so long since we've been there that the prices have gone up without me noticing..

The weather stayed fine while we were shopping, which was just as well since it took a while to load everything into the car, and we would have got rather wet if it had been raining.

Unfortunately, the winch system that we should be able to use to bring our shopping upstairs is not working at present. So it looked as if we were going to be up and down our stairs,carrying in supermarket bags, for several minutes. So we were rather pleased with our friends Sheila and Marie drew up in their car, and asked if they could come and change the books Marie had borrowed. Of course, I said... and wondered if they'd like to help carry things in! They obliged willingly, so we only had two trips up and down per person.

We chatted awhile, then Richard went off to King Malu, to work on the inside since it was too damp to paint the outside. I unpacked the groceries and put most of them away, then sat down to read and write some email.

About half an hour later the heavens opened. And it poured. We've seen some heavy rain in Cyprus at times, but I don't remember ever seeing quite such a concerted effort as this storm. It kept going for at least two hours, solidly.

It's very difficult to capture rain in a still photograph, but here's my best attempt. If nothing else you can see how grey the day looks in our neighbourhood. The flat roof over the road is shining with rain, and if you look hard you can see rain splashing off the street. At the bottom right of the picture you can actually see some rain, caught by the camera:


Even that doesn't show the incredible downpour. I think Terry Pratchett described best what we had today, in his excellent book for children, 'Truckers':

'..the kind of rain that is merely an upright sea with slots in it '

The problem with heavy rain is that our roof still leaks over our indoor staircase. So I placed not just the bucket, but the large coolbox on the stairs to catch most of the rain:


It was only dripping into these receptacles, but by the time the rain ceased, there were at least 5cm of water in each of them.

I shall be interested to see how full the Salt Lake is now.

Very strange!

Yesterday morning, Richard had a phone call from DHL. They said a parcel had arrived for Daniel, from India, addressed to a PO Box address in Larnaka and a phone number in Paphos. Ringing the Paphos number didn't get anywhere, so they looked in the Larnaka directory, found that we were the only people with our surname, and tried the number. Good thing it was transferred when we moved!

Richard gave them our street address, and they said they would deliver the parcel within the next couple of days. That afternoon, the van arrived and I received the package. So, top marks to DHL for using common sense and being efficient.

It wasn't a heavy package. It felt like some papers, or a booklet. The paper attached to the front said it was from Maruti Suzuki, which sounded a bit odd, and since Dan hadn't mentioned anything arriving from India I thought I'd better open it. Inside was an envelope with a picture of a car, and the message: 'Gift a Maruki Suzuki to someone you love in India'. Hmmmm.

I opened the envelope. My instinct was correct. Dan has been sent some junk mail by a car company in India! Not even a charity, but a company who appear to be targetting wealthy ex-pat Indians, inviting them to buy discounted cars for their relatives back home.

Which leaves a few questions in our minds:

• How did they get his name and address?
• Whose is the Paphos phone number and how was that mixed with Dan's details?
• Why would they send a Brit living in Cyprus, travelling the world for two years as a volunteer, junk mail intended for well-off Indians?

And the most puzzling question of all:

• Why on earth would they send something like this by DHL?? It must have cost at least £20, and in India that's a HUGE amount of money...

Settling down in the new house

So we're more than half way through July. That struck me this morning, when Richard pointed out that tomorrow is our 26th anniversary. Wow. In the busy-ness of recent weeks, I'd lost track of the date. We'll probably go out to eat in the evening - taking Tim along, if he's doing nothing else. We need to make the most of the time when he's still living at home, as it won't be many more years until he flies the nest. In the morning we thought we might buy a few plants since we have no garden as such - just paved carports and a large front porch. At some point we're considering digging up the paving at one side, but not at this time of year. Of course it's not really a good time to buy new plants but it would be nice to have some to start us off. We'll get more in the Autumn, no doubt.

Yesterday and today I unpacked more boxes in the study. There are built-in cupboards along one of the walls, which are now full of paperwork/magazines/pictures not yet hung. But it does look tidier. Tonight Richard's colleague from Egypt is coming to supper and then helping to paint the study. He's very keen to work on the house, so we're making the most of it.

The downstairs guest flat is still fairly full of boxes, but Richard's put together the two single beds in one of the guest rooms, and the living room of the flat has two sofa-beds, so if necessary we could have four guests (more if they were small children). We need to have a door knocked into what's going to be the master bedroom downstairs, since it was a hairdresser salon, separate from the main house. As it was originally part of the living room, the dividing wall is easy to cut through. But unlike in the UK, we can't buy doors and wood for frames from a DIY store and then put it in place ourselves. We have to employ a carpenter, who will make the door exactly as we want it. This probably won't be too expensive, and we've asked someone to look into this, so we can get the guest flat at least basically organised.

Some friends had considered coming to stay at the start of August, which would have motivated us to get the guest rooms painted and in good condition rapidly - however they're not now coming until next year.

But... a couple of days ago Richard had a phone call about someone who was visiting Lebanon, is currently elsewhere in the region, and now - obviously - strongly advised not to return to Lebanon. So she may be coming to stay. We don't know if there will be other refugees: yesterday a boatload of Italians and French people arrived here, and apparently there will soon be some Brits. There are a significant number of ex-pats in the Christian/mission world in Lebanon, so there may well be a call for temporary accommodation. If so, we'd like to be ready. It's only about six weeks since we were briefly in Beirut; hard to imagine that this busy, European style city is now under siege.

What we still need to do in the main part of the house:

- paint study (this evening, we hope) then hang curtains and one or two pictures
- paint Dan's room and put his cabin bed together
- paint hall/stairs/landing and then put up family photo gallery
- fix ceiling fans and/or light shades for bedrooms
- sort out Dan's and Tim's curtains
- buy mirror and light fitting for loo
- find some kind of mirror for our room
- find some way of fitting a cat door

Which isn't really all that much, certainly compared to all the houses we've lived in before. We might well get all that done by the end of July.

At some point we need to ensure we get a final certificate of approval for the main part of the house. Just in case anyone actually wants to follow the plot - so to speak - and hasn't a clue what I'm talking about, I described the potential problems here, what we learned here, and what transpired here.

In a nutshell: the main part of the house, ie the top two storeys, had planning permission, but the building did not entirely follow the plans. Nor were the plans totally accurate. An architect can sort it all out for us (at a cost) so long as we do it soon. It's not dangerous, or even illegal - but until we have the certificate, we could have problems if we wanted to sell it. Not that we do, of course. But one day we might.

As for the downstairs part of the house, that still needs a LOT of work. Painting everywhere. Light fittings almost everywhere. Curtains - which I shall probably adapt from the curtains we had at our previous house - almost everywhere. The door cut through to the front bedroom. Beds in place. Kitchen equipped with more than the 'spare' stuff we don't use much. And all the remaining boxes need to be unpacked, with homes found for the contents.

It would be much easier if we could leave this until the weather gets cooler, but it's probably best to keep going. A little at a time.

An afternoon in Nicosia and a cultural evening

It started when we learned that the Bristol Old Vic theatre school were doing a tour in Cyprus, showing Shakespeare's 'As you like it'. Their Larnaka performance is this Saturday, at Theatre Antidote and we would love to have gone to see it. However we had already booked with our church house group to go to Kourium, to see - oddly enough - Shakespeare's 'Midsummer Nights' Dream' on Saturday night.

But, since there was a Thursday night performance of 'As you like it' in Nicosia, we decided to go to that. Tim likes Shakespeare but hasn't seen many live performances (well, neither have we...), the Old Vic company have a great reputation, and Richard and Tim wanted to visit a couple of other places in Nicosia anyway. The prices weren't even particularly high. So after lunch yesterday, we filled up with petrol and drove to Nicosia.

The car air-conditioning is just about working, but it's not very effective and I was partially in the sun all the way, so it's a good thing that it only takes about 40 minutes to get to the outskirts. We wanted to look in the Super Home Centre store first and reckoned it was big enough that it would probably be open all day, rather than closing for a couple of hours over lunchtime for siesta, as most shops do. Sure enough, it was open so we spent half an hour wandering round. Unfortunately there's something about the lighting in that shop that makes me feel queasy after more than about twenty minutes, so we didn't hang around.

We were hoping they might have some good beds - we've promised Tim a new bed when we move house -but the choice was limited. Nor did they have any bookcases other than veneered plastic-looking ones, and rattan - attractive, but not very big, and the cats love to sharpen their claws on rattan. They didn't have any widescreen TVs, and their general choice of kitchen appliances etc was slightly worse than those in Larnaka. Nor did they have any curtains. We did see some quite nice rugs that were machine washable, and may consider those when we've actually moved, but we didn't buy anything.

Then we went across the car park to another store called Mega-Mart, which turned out to be not very mega at all, although quite interesting. It had an eclectic mixture of ornaments, lighting and furniture, plus kitchen bits and pieces, crockery, and so on. There were some very attractive country style wooden bookcases, but the prices were unbelievably high.

Tim wanted to visit a couple of music shops, as we're considering getting an electronic piano rather than buying the piano we've currently borrowed. He would really like something at concert pitch and has been impressed with some electronic pianos recently. They'll never be quite as nice as a good quality real piano, but then we don't want to pay several thousand pounds! His keyboard is actually good enough for him to do future exams on (it's a full keyboard, fully weighted, touch sensitive, etc) but that's going to live in the 'studio' room in our guest flat, and we'd like a piano of some sort in our main living room. Behringer are apparently bringing out a new electronic piano in a couple of months, which is excellent value, and has an action which Tim particularly likes. However as it's new, he doesn't know what it will sound like or whether he will like the feel of it, so he's considering other options too.

We hunted for the Kawai shop in vain. The address was from a three-year-old Yellow Pages, so perhaps they've moved. We did find Nakas, [NB most of their web-site doesn't work in Firefox, unfortunately] but they were closed for siesta, re-opening at 4pm, and it was only quarter to four when we arrived. We didn't plan to sit around outside in the excessive heat (despite Nicosia being distinctly less humid than Larnaka, it's usually even hotter) so we went on to look for the Mitsubishi showroom to check what they had second-hand, since Richard's looking for a four-wheel drive car to use for work, and also to have a rather better vehicle than our current 17-year-old Lancer.

By then I had already had enough of shopping, so I stayed in the car and read - thankfully I had remembered to pick up the book I was currently reading - while Richard and Tim had a look at what was available. They were pleasantly surprised to find prices much better than they had expected, although there isn't a huge choice of used cars. Once we've moved and settled in to our new house, they may return for a test-drive.

We returned to Nakas, and Tim tried out their least expensive Clavinovas, but wasn't impressed. The better specification ones cost several thousand, so we're not considering those.

Since we still had plenty of time, Richard suggested we look at one of the new indoor shopping centres. After some driving around (Nicosia is a sprawling city, very confusing for visitors) we found it. It looked just like a British indoor shopping centre, even down to a multi-storey car park. Rather a good idea in Cyprus since it meant the car was parked out of the sun! There was a big Orphanides there, where we bought some juice and water, although as it was all on one floor it seemed huge. I prefer the Orphanides in Larnaka where there are three storeys.

Most of the other shops in the centre seemed like typical shopping centre places... SockShop, various small clothing boutiques, a stationer, and so on. Boring. Next-door to Orphanides there was a home furnishings shop, but I couldn't face another shop by that stage. Richard loves shopping even when not planning to buy things (I know this is supposed to be a female trait, but in our family it's the other way around) so he wandered around that, while I sat on a convenient bench and read some more.

The only two places to eat in the centre were McDonalds (which we never go to - ugh) and Pizza Hut, which was tempting - but as Tim is not eating any dairy products, that was no good. So we left and drove for half an hour (how can any city be so huge?!) and found a Goody's. Richard and Tim had club sandwiches with chips (Tim carefully removing his slices of cheese) and I was pleased to find there was a salad bar, so I had a large bowlful with quite a variety including an excellent tuna/pasta salad.

Then we drove to the Russian Cultural Centre, which we found very easily as it's marked on the map, after slight confusion when we saw that it's Greek name was the Russian Political Centre. There was a large foyer with a lot of paintings on the walls and some comfortable chairs. The doors to the theatre opened at 8pm and we were glad to be early, as it meant we could get good seats near the centre. By 8.30, it was pretty full and it only started about five minutes late - not bad for Cyprus!

There was a minimalist set, no backdrop and no curtains at the front of the stage. Twelve actors were involved, most of them taking more than one part. We were entranced almost immediately, and very much enjoyed it. The seats were nowhere near as comfortable as those in Antidote Theatre, but there was a break of about half an hour in the middle, when about half the audience rushed outside to smoke! We were horrified when we first came to Cyprus, to realise how prevalent cigarettes are, but at least they're now banned inside theatres and cinemas.

The second act didn't begin until about ten o'clock, by which time I was pretty tired - I usually get up about 6am, and am NOT a night-owl - but I managed to stay awake. I was somewhat irritated by two people behimd me who started chewing gum during the second act... a disgusting habit, with loud chomping and smacking of lips. So rude in a theatre! I thought it must be teenage boys, and was quite shocked when the play ended, and the house lights came up, to realise it was two nice-looking American ladies who must have been in their sixties! However by covering one of my ears I managed to block out most of the chewing noises and concentrate on the play, which continued to be excellent, including some very well-performed songs and a couple of short basic dance routines.

All in all, highly recommended. There's only one more performance in Cyprus (the one at Theatre Antidote on Saturday) but they may be touring elsewhere. Advance booking recommended.

By the time the play had finished, it was 11.15pm and I was nearly asleep on my feet. I sat in the back of the car and must have dropped off almost at once, since it felt to me as if the journey home took no more than ten minutes!

It occurs to us that we've been out more in the evenings in the past week than we have for many months. Youth group variety night last Friday, music school concert last Saturday, Famagusta service on Sunday, theatre in Nicosia last night, and theatre in Kourium (just beyond Limassol) on Saturday. When we arrived back, Sophia greeted us very noisily, informing us in no uncertain terms that she was NOT impressed at our being out so often, or so late!