Frank and Joan's news for 27 July 2008 in Northern Cyprus

Frank and Joan's Adventures in Northern Cyprus

Our adventures in the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus continue....

Up really early this morning to do some pruning and hedge cutting befor eit gets too hot. Guess what? My 6 year old hedge trimmer, that has been misbehaving for a while, finally decided enough was enough and packed up all together. I did manage to get the front hedge done before this happened and then resorted to the old fashioned hand clippers. Far too much like hard work in the heat, so that's the end of that until I get some new electric kit.

At 11 o'clock Stewart turned up for brunch. We had said something about, black pudding, bacon, sausage, grilled toms and fried eggs etc, on Wednesday evening and the idea seemed to appeal to him.

The rest of a very hot and humid day was spent in lazy mode, in the pool, reading etc and then rounded off with some BBQ chicken and salad and a bottle of wine, in the cool of the evening.

The newspaper reports that official talks about re-unification are to s

tart in September. After these plans are agreed by both sides then simultaneous referendums will be staged on both sides, to allow the people to make the final decidion. Still think that it will be along drawn out process, but progress we have.

You know we have been saying how the economy here is struggling, well a report by the Social and Economic Research centre has suggested that up to £2 billion has been lost due to unsold properties. They also found that the government is losing up to £200 million a year due to delays in permssion to purchase applications. Now many have been saying this for some time, but is there an underlying reason, such as no desire to issue more deeds whilst re-unification talks are on going. Who knows.

In a desperate attempt to raise more funds, the government has decided to raise road tax fees. For example, on my Honda estate I paid 115 YTL this year and this will be 360 YTL next time round. At the same time driving licence fees and other charges from this department have also increased drastically causing a bit of an uproar among the general public. The Consumers Association has asked the government to resign honourably as they clearly cannot control the economy.

Work has started again on the Amaranta site after a deal with a Turkish company. The promise is that those people who wanted their properties completed will get them by Xmas, others will get their money back when completed properties are resold and the Turkish company gets the remaining 40 properties, which were not sold as its profit for completing. Progress at last, lets hope so.

A $350 million project to pipe water from Turkey, under the sea, has been agreed. Work is to start next June and the pipeline will be completed by 2012. In the meantime we will struggle if we don't get very heavy winter rains.