Cyprus

[Yes, I’ve been very quiet lately. Blame my laptop for quitting on me just when I’d entrusted it with all my travel planning. Also, we’ve been busy doing stuff, which makes for tired people and no time to write.]

 It’s just a one-hour flight from Amman to Paphos in Cyprus, so of course it took us close on ten hours to get from our apartment there to our new base in Nicosia – an hour to get to the airport, just in case, three hours at the airport like the obedient citizens that we are, an hour flying, 2 ½ hours waiting for the shuttle bus, 1 ½ hours on the shuttle etc.

 We were driven to the airport by one of Jordan’s finest taxi drivers: he told Mark not to worry about putting the seatbelt on because it’s Jordan and nobody worries about that [I was in the back seat, where there simply was no seatbelt], then drank his coffee, smoked cigarettes and talked on his phone while weaving from lane to lane on the motorway, every few minutes choosing a new music video on YouTube on the second phone mounted on his dashboard and braking viciously for speed cameras. To make it a truly memorable ride he also insisted we pay him an extra couple of dinars for parking at the airport.

Ah, Jordan.

On the shuttle bus from Paphos to Nicosia we were like wide-eyed kids. Did you see that? He indicated before he changed lanes! And that woman’s leaving enough room for two buses to fit between her and the car in front. In Nicosia our amazement continued. It was rush hour and traffic was moving slowly, and it was... quiet.

After the noise and dust of Amman, Cyprus was very peaceful, other than the church bells working overtime for Orthodox Holy Week. Lots of the locals speak good English, and they even drive on the left, just like home. There’s clearly still a bit of bitterness between north and south – from the balcony of our apartment we could see a huge and ostentatious Turkish flag lit up on the steep northern hills at night. We crossed between the two sides several times; on foot it’s simple, though the queues can be long if tour groups are going through, and I got the feeling they don’t see very many NZ passports. There are large signs warning about the penalties for crossing the border with counterfeit goods, possibly because of the shops on the northern side selling ‘genuine’ Rolexes for 40 euros and Nikes for 10.

Highlights of our six days in Cyprus:

Nicosia both south...

 and north

Famagusta (aka Gazimagusta).

   A cheap if somewhat bumpy bus trip from north Nicosia, with a bus driver who creepily chatted up any girls who got on. Famagusta has, um, ruins. Venetian stuff. Mark will probably explain. There’s an eerie ghost town of abandoned hotels in  the strip in between north and south – one day it was a thriving resort & the next it was abandoned. The Turkish Cypriot police have very little sense of humour, so I did decide to obey the signs and not take photos, but you can google Varosha to find pictures taken by tougher travellers.

 Kyrenia (aka Girne)

Another bus trip in the north. A gorgeous old harbour full of fishing boats. And a castle, of course.  

Kiti

Home of the creepiest Easter decorations I’ve ever seen.

Larnaca

Larnaca town is pretty much what you’d expect Palmerston North to be like if it turned into a beach resort. But there was a Good Friday evening parade right under our balcony, and lots of fireworks after midnight mass.

Limassol  

Can't decide whether to buy the superyacht or the villa on the waterfront... why not have both. (Thanks, little girl on the El Paso ad.)

And literacy
After less than a day in Cyprus I was able to read several words in Greek (boring stuff like exit and water). This was exciting for me because three months in Jordan had made me think the language part of my brain was broken – I never did get past three or four letters of the alphabet.