Summer in Cyprus: Sweltering, Spraying, and Staying Indoors

Holiday brochures advertise Cyprus with 'sun, sea and surf' (or similar). Which is all very well for visitors, staying in hotels by the beach for a week or two. But when one lives in Cyprus, it's not quite so simple... 

June this year was - by Cyprus standards - reasonably cool. Warm enough that we didn't need to wear anything other than tee shirts and shorts. I switched from trainers to sandals, too, or flip-flops... I much prefer wearing trainers and socks but strongly dislike having over-warm sweaty feet. 

By the end of May we had started using our bedroom ceiling fan at night, and some of the other ceiling fans in the daytime, as needed. But through the whole of June there was no need for air conditioning, even for the computers. With windows open, a pleasant breeze cooled the house through the day. 

Then we spent twelve days in the UK, as I wrote about in another post. It was busy, and productive, and - for me, at any rate - a wonderful break, seeing many of the people I love the most. We arrived back in Larnaka after 10pm on July 12th and while it was warm - I had removed my coat and sweater before leaving the plane - it wasn't unpleasantly so. I was particularly pleased that it didn't feel humid, since we had to spend about ten minutes standing on the steps of the plane waiting for the bus to the terminal. 

Sweltering...

Reality hit home in the morning. I didn't wake up until about 7.30am, and it was already thirty degrees outside, according to my phone's weather app. But although I was tired, I knew I had to get to the froutaria for some oranges and other fruit for our breakfast. So I went out, keeping mainly in the shade. It was probably good to get some fresh air and sunshine first thing, but I don't think I appreciated it much. 

That was the start of a heatwave that lasted two weeks, breaking all kinds of records. Most of the southern part of Europe experienced something similar. Then a couple of days that were more normal, for Cyprus in July, and then there was another high temperature warning for the next few days.

'How do you cope?' This is a question I'm asked regularly. I've never been good with hot temperatures, and I know from experience that if I'm outside in the sunshine, or if temperatures are more than about 30C at most, I really don't 'cope'. I become slow, lethargic, and often develop a migraine. 

So over the years in Cyprus I've developed a kind of summer routine. While I often try to be out of Cyprus for a few weeks, there are always some hot summer days when I'm here. I used to say that I do everything I need to do before 8am, then 'aestivate' until the evening. I don't actually go to sleep, but I don't leave the house, if at all possible. I shop locally first thing, and if we have to go to a bigger supermarket, we go in the evening rather than the daytime. 

Spraying

One of the things I like least about Cyprus summers is the increased insect population. Not mosquitoes - they are worse in the spring and autumn, and we mostly avoid those in the house by having netting over open windows. No, my 'bête noire' is, literally, a black beast whose name I still slightly shudder to mention.  (Whispering): Cockroaches.  

I had hoped that by having our house connected to the mains drainage there would be fewer - certainly we have fewer access chambers in our side yard, and the lids fit much better. But a neighbouring house was having a lot of major renovations and for the last couple of weeks of June, and most of July, we had at least one of these nasty beasties in the house every day.  Mostly deceased, I'm relieved to say. Some caught by the cats, and some stunned by the 'biokill' spray. I use that liberally around all possible entrances and as many hiding places as I can think of. 

I did this as soon as the first one appeared in June, and again just before we went away. Then I repeated the process at the end of July.  Thankfully there have been fewer since August started.  

Salads

One feature of the last few years has been eating a lot of salads; not just lettuce and tomatoes but a wide variety of different salads, inspired by both cookery books and online sites. This, for instance, is a sardine and lentil-based salad: 

From July 1st until at least August 31st, I don't turn on the oven. Originally I determined to do all the food preparation first thing in the morning, but that hasn't happened this year. It's mostly in the half hour or so before we eat. 

After lunch on Sundays we have, for a couple of years, eaten dark chocolate Bounty bars - not entirely dairy-free but low-enough in dairy that they're not a problem for Richard. 

We used to buy these in airports before flying back to Cyprus, then for a while they were available here. Nearly two years ago, we mentioned this to some friends who were soon to fly out, and they scoured their neighbourhood, bringing out over 40 of these bars, enough to last nearly a year. Here are just a few of them:

Alas, they were discontinued nearly a year ago. We didn't realise this, but were disappointed not to find any during our UK trip in January. We did look again earlier this month, but were not surprised to find them still unavailable. 

On the Sunday after we returned, we ate the last of our stash. Possibly the last dark chocolate Bounty in Cyprus... 

Celebration

A week after our return, we celebrated our anniversary. The heatwave was intense, and I didn't even want to go out in the evening. So we ordered a Lebanese takeaway, which was delicious: 

It was excellent value, too  Supposedly a vegetarian meze for two, it was twice as much as we could eat in one sitting, so it provided a second main meal the following day.  To make it even better value Richard had just been sent a seven euro discount voucher from Foody. 

Staying indoors

My aestivation might sound like a kind of lockdown, but it's not the same at all as the restrictions we were under three-and-a-half years ago. The main theoretical difference is that it's my decision, rather than being enforced by anyone else. Richard, who deals much better than I do with heat, has been out by car in the daytime many times to see people, or visit his boat, or pick something up at one of the DIY stores.

A major practical difference between my self-enforced aestivation and a lockdown is that there's no restriction on the people we see. A few weeks ago, we were invited to a young friend's 18th birthday dinner; it was the first time I'd been out in an evening since we returned from the UK, and the outside temperature was 36 degrees even at 5.30pm. I struggled to walk the short distance from the car to our friend's home, and was thankful it was not at lunchtime (as in previous years). 

However it was a very enjoyable evening, spent in our friends' air conditioned living room. 

Our friends continue to come for games mornings on Tuesdays, though during the summer we play in my study with the air conditioning on, sitting on the floor, rather than at the dining room table:

And another young friend, far more able to deal with the heat than I am, has been doing some repairs on the side of our house, where the surface spritz had been crumbling away. 

Steps

I don't want to lose the habit of daily walking. So I still aim to get out almost every morning at about 6am, if only to walk the 500 metres or so to the froutaria and back. On mornings when the temperature shows 30 degrees or more by 6am (and that's happened three or four times) that's more than enough. 

On mornings when it is only 24-25 degrees, I walk a couple of kilometres around the local neighbourhood. It's not a lot, but it gives me some fresh air and exercise, albeit limited. For the last few days our friends have been away and I've walked to their house shortly after 6am to feed their cats and (a couple of times) water their garden. Thankfully the temperature was only 26-28 by the time I was home again at around 7.30. 

During the less hot periods of the year - usually mid-September to late June - I walk an average of about 7,000 - 8,000 steps per day, or around 50,000 - 55,000 per week. When we were in London, walking all over the place, this continued. But at this time of year, I just about manage 30,000 in a week.  

I'm relieved to know, due to some recent research, that we only actually need around 2,500 steps per day (at a reasonable pace) to benefit our hearts and blood vessels, and around 4,000 to start reducing the risk of premature dying. More than that has a greater benefit, of course; but according to a Japanese study, the optimum number is around 5,000 - 7,000. That does talk about 'older people', and I'm not yet quite at the age they mention, but for me this is achievable. Much more is not. 

I'm trying to use my indoor air conditioned time productively: sorting and backing up photos, maintaining my websites, doing some filing, tidying up my folders, spending a bit longer at Duolingo. And reading a bit more than usual. August - so far - has been a tad cooler than July (which was apparently the hottest month ever recorded globally). The days are noticeably getting shorter and a month from now we might even be able to stop using the air conditioning.

As for the beach... we went there once with our grandchildren in April, It's been too hot to go there so far, this summer, and we haven't yet found a suitable evening to go with our friends. If we don't manage it this summer, I won't mind at all.