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Our adventures in the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus continue....
I have received an interesting e-mail over the weekend and with the permission of the sender I reprint it here.
It is interesting that this guys Turkish Cypriot neighbour has these views and I did go back to him and asked him to talk to his neighbour at length about pushing his local MP and MEP, to get up in parliament and start promoting the Turkish Cypriot stance and asking for the EU in particular to honour their promises. There is a nasty rumour going around today that will do nobody any good in the current climate of property sales and values. The rumour is that Greatstone Construction have made application for bankruptcy. I have had the opportunity to check this out and it is blatantly untrue. I have also talked this through with Tass, the MD of Greatstone and I believe him when he says, "If I was going to do this, then I would firstly mail all my customers and suppliers in advance". He fully admits that times are very hard and that he has discussed the consequences with his lawyers and accountant should he need to consider this action, but is quite specific in saying that it will be the very last resort as far as he is concerned. it is a great shame that people can start these rumours without considering the consequences, guess it is probably another of those blog site insinuations. The news is still hot around the talks, the Orams decision and the overall attitude of the greek Cypriots, the EU and the UN. Firstly the Prime Minister is setting up a legal team to try to find out how the Orams case went so wrong. This is obviously a little of closing the gate after the horse has bolted but necessary to ensure that if there are to be any further cases, the legal teams are better prepared. Questions are finally being asked as to whether the UN is really aware of the reasons why it has been unable to broker a deal since 1964. Does it really understand the problems and the cause of all that goes on here on the island. Does the UN recognise that Greek Cypriots do not want the sort of peace deal that Mr Talat is trying to negotiate. If we end up with an agreement similar to the Treaty of Guarantee signed up by Britain, Turkey, Greece and the Islanders, what is to stop the Greek Cypriots doing what they did in 1963 when Makarios made amendments to the constitution removing all the human rights from Turkish Cypriots and signaling the start of the herding of the Turkish Cypriots in to enclaves and the genocide that followed. Politicians around the world always only want to hear what they want to hear and ignore the truth. The EU, who should not be involved in discussions about the island and who have been told quite specifically to keep their noses out of the peace negotiations, have passed a resolution that Turkey should remove its troops from the island and hand back Maras to the Greek Cypriots. This they insist is part of the terms needed to further the possible addition of Turkey to the EU. The Turkish PM has said that it is only possible to accept reports from the EU if they are unbiased and unhampered by the internal politics of the European Parliament. It is clear that the Cyprus side of this report is shaped by the Greek Cypriot demands, whom the EU stupidly allowed into the bloc after the 2004 referendum. The Turkish prime minister has stated this week that there will be "No Surrender". The EU process is important for Turkey he says, however, it is not important enough to sacrifice Cyprus. When will the EU realise that it is being exploited by its own stupidity in allowing the south to become members and that it is because of their entry, the Turkish Cypriots have not been awarded all the things promised after the referendum in 2004. Maybe I am being stupid, but to me all this stuff that is being bandied around is a clear indication that the talks are going no place. The only agreement the Greeks want is the island and only the whole island under their control which is exactly what they tried to achieve back in 1963. The only lighter thing on the horizon is the report that Greece itself is deep in the mire financially and may be forced to toe the line in the Eurozone. Last night, Joan and I went out with friends Mike and Ebru, for a Valentines night party. The Green Palace had put on a special evening which included the full Turkish meze and some quite loud Turkish music. We had a very pleasant evening, but now we are going to have to go back again with them, as we had explained how really good the T-bone steaks were and they were not part of last nights menu.
An interesting article in the Cyprus Mail today:-
Slightly depleted numbers at Boys Night Out. Charles was under orders to go to the church hall for pancakes and a quiz night, the rest of us organised pancakes at home and then a few beers out. Never mind Charles, you can't win them all. Joan and I went to Nicosia this morning to see about the kitchen cupboard units we need eventually for France and so decided to nip across the border and get some cat food etc. At the border I was asked to accept this paper form the border policeman telling me that I had two outstanding speeding fines and that they had to be paid within 7 days. They must have been frantically updating the computer systems as one of these was for August and the other October 2009. The interesting thing aout the August fine was that it was on 29th, our anniversary and when Joan and I were in Dubai. Must have a word with Anne as she had access to the car whilst we were away. Yesterday evening twelve of the Layabouts went to The Acmenya restaurant for one of our regular evenings out. This restaurant has always remained consistently good and with a wide choice on the menu at good prices. Always a fun evening and I guess one that Joan and I will miss when we eventually make it to France.
In today's newspaper the builders here in TRNC are turning on the government and saying that they, the government, must act over the drop in business. Now that has to be a sort of laugh, maybe they don't know about world recession and the overall drop in business across Europe. The chairman of the Contractors Union says that they must take an itsy bitsy bit of the blame for the state of things. He does mention, poor quality construction, houses being double sold, mortgages taken out on land after homes on it have been sold and of course the Orams, I suppose we could go on in this vain. I cannot believe, that they believe, that lower VAT and stoppage tax, discount on title deed fees is going to solve the issue. Now if they pressurised the government to improve planning and building control issues to make people more confident, then that would be interesting. The recent flooding in Guzelyurt, during the heavy rains recently, has caused people to complain at last about ravines, which form natural water courses, being filled in by building rubbish. This has been happening as long as we have been here and still goes on unchecked. A lot of the 4 million TL damage recently could have been avoided if the water courses had been kept open. The immovable properties commission has agreed a deal with a Greek Cypriot for the return of 60 donums of land in Getikoy and £600,000 compensation for 7 donums of land and a house here in Lapta. Today is blood donors day, so have to be off now to the hospital in Girne and then maybe get some light gardening done on our return as the weather is beginning to warm up.
Next weekend is the annual charity walk for the cancer fund, so we thought we should get some practice in before. This morning was a clear bright sky so Joan and I had an early BLT then drove out to Getikoy Village which is about 15 minutes away. You can park outside the village and then walk all around the reservoir. There are some quite steep sections but it is a lovely walk which you can find if you follow the arrows, providing always of course that somebody hasn't taken them away as souvenirs. It really is a lovely walk around this area but be prepared for some steep; and at this time of the year some muddy bits. Only a couple of months ago this reservoir was drained completely, so it is great to see that there will probably not be a water shortage this coming summer. All along the paths and up the banking areas there are hundreds of wild flowers which have really done well after the rains and now of course encouraged by the warmer weather. We even saw some wild fennel which had what looked like a pair of baby ostrich growing out of the centre. High up the mountain you can see the various rock strata and as a result of the rains some rock pieces had clearly come tumbling down. This particular piece had some super etched markings. We had also noticed that in all the pine trees there were what looked like nests, formed around the actual cones which must have served as an anchor. These looked as if they had been woven by spider threads and were clearly too small for a bird. Further on, in a warmer sunnier spot, the mystery was solved, caterpillars. Dozens of them coming of of the base of this particular nest, so I suppose we can expect swarms of butterflies in the near future. It took us around 2 hours 15 minutes to traverse the reservoir and at one stage we had to find stepping stones over a small ravine like stream, where water was still flowing quite well to continue the topping up. It did start to rain just a little but not enough to dampen the spirits but an enjoyable morning.
Just one final pic to show extent of road damage . It is amazing just how much power this water has and just how deep it was able to cut out the road surface. Some of us just look back on being confined to barracks for two whole days whilst it rained and then say who cares once the sun comes out again. On the last Thursday of every month the ladies from keep fit classes at The Black Olive, have a lunch. Because this would be the last one before Joan's actual birthday, Vicki made her a lemon drizzle cake with just one candle in it. Seventy would have brought in the fire brigade. Joan made sure there was slice for all, plus one extra for me to have with my afternoon coffee.
We have had a number of e-mails about the caterpillars. Seems they are called processional caterpillars and if you brush against them they can give you a very nasty rash. I had said to Joan that they reminded me of similar caterpillars we used to get on the golf course in Rye, Kent. I remember that if people went off the fairway they used to poke around carefully looking for their ball and using a club only. Last evening the gang went to The Grumpy Grouse restaurant, which is on the way down to Girne, just passed the Denizkizi turn off. This place has very new owners but was as good as it has always been, well worth a visit. Shortly after we got home it started to rain fairly heavily. This was followed by thunder and lightening and exceptionally heavy rain for the whole night. The time is now midday and there is no sign of it letting up. Outside the road is a river and it is flowing into Charles and Yvonne's garden as the first point of entry, then it is gushing through the drainage pipes in the wall and flooding the rose garden and any minute now all that muddy water will be heading off into the pool. The water is then flowing across the terrace area and now we have our own small stream which then ultimately crosses over into next doors garden and heads off down the hill. Joan tried to get in to Girne at around 10 o'clock this morning as she had some old customers staying in the Acapulco who wanted to meet her. She had to turn back at Tempo supermarket as the fire engines were there pumping out and the roads are completely closed. Guess if it does ease off later we will try it together. As the day progressed the rain got heavier so we were glad that Joan had made it back. Soon after she got back she shouted to me that water together withgravel and sand was pouring in to our driveway and the whole front garden was beginning to flood. We got out onto the road quickly and together with the help of Charles we built a dam to divert as much as possible in to the field area opposite. Later investigation showed that tons of water was coming down a ravine on the other side of the main road, this was going under a culvert which crossed the road and the we can only assume that the natural flow was blocked off, because the water just gushed off the field and started to create a new river bed down our road.
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We have been here since July 2002 and in all that time have ever known a winter as cold as this one We have had some very heavy rainfall over the recent weeks, which is good, as it is reported that the reservoirs are rapidly filling up. But what we have never experienced is this very cold weather. We have the gas fire running all day backed up by the radiators but one of the things that we keep remembering is that houses here are not insulated in any way and it is often much warmer outside. 
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