Should old acquaintance be forgot

Cyprus in a year ...

January 2013

world record for getting it wrong

The government had to withdraw and reprint more than half a million general election ballot sheets after Guinness World Records objected to the unauthorised use of its logo.  Presidential candidate Andreas Efstratiou, who owns a bridal wear shop, had previously won the world record for creating the longest wedding dress train.  The record has since been superseded, preventing Efstratiou's legal use of the logo.  He had to pay back the Cyprus government 15,000 euro for the ballot reprint.  He didn't win the election either ... 

February 

Mr. Resurrection and his top financial advisor

... but this man did.  The 67-year-old right-wing conservative leader, Nicos Anastasiades, got 57.5% of the vote in a final showdown against the communist party-backed Stavros Malas.  Boasting of his connections with European centre-right leaders, Anastasiades promised to resurrect the island's economy from its impending quicksand death.  A masterplan which has gone brilliantly so far.  Go, Nick, go.  Happy voters know they made the right choice.


March 

carrying an invisible knife 

And then it all kicks off.  The good news:  10 billion euro aid package to come from Brussels.  The catch:  it's not enough.  Private savings accounts to be raided to make up the shortfall.  Mass panic run on cashpoint machines while trembling bank employees hold their teddy bears behind closed doors for 10 days.  Furious protesters rally outside the presidential palace, chanting: "Troika out of Cyprus".  Putin not amused, threatens to withdraw aid if Russian off-shore accounts on the island are hit.  Cameron objects to the suggested levies on British troops' accounts.  Meltdown.  

April

Michael Sarris:  last seen on a yacht in the Cayman Islands

Even the Archbishop of Cyprus gets involved in the melee.  Chrysostom II - a well known economic expert - publicly advises the finance minister, Michael Sarris, to resign.  So he does.  Coincidentally, Sarris is the former chairman of the Laiki Bank - the same bank that is to be dissolved.  And, he disappears just as a formal investigation is launched into the events leading to the financial crisis.  Handy.  Meanwhile, Anastasiades does an Oliver Twist and asks the EU:  please, sir, can I have some more?  

May

Ayia Napa:  a peaceful and civilised haven

A Cyprus court finds a British-Somalian man guilty of manslaughter in the fatal stabbing of a British soldier in Ayia Napa, and jails him for 8 years.  Although the resort, known for its lively night life, is officially off bounds to British soldiers stationed on the island, Fusilier David Lee Collins, 19, was involved in a night club brawl there the night before he was to begin a tour in Afghanistan.  A surprisingly quick legal process and result for the Cyprus courts.  Ex-president Christofias is still safe somewhere in Russia.  


June

one way to drown sorrows

Non-euro holding tourists take advantage of favourable exchange rates, and revenue from tourism in Cyprus goes up in June, compared to the same time last year.  The Swiss were the biggest spenders in Cyprus this summer, followed by Russians and Austrians.  The average stay increased to 10.1 days, compared to 9.5 days in June 2012, while the average daily expenditure by tourists went up from 81.5 to 83.3 euro per day.  Hey, those 2 euros a day make all the difference!  [data source:  Famagusta Gazette]


July

resurrecting unemployment

Just when we thought it was safe selling ice creams and beach bats, Eurostat releases gloomy figures of rising Cypriot unemployment.  For the under-25s, unemployment hits 30%.  The IMF forecasts that instead of fixing problems, the austere bailout terms may have plunged the island into an even deeper long-term economic decline.  President Anastasiades said:  "I am not a magician." [The New York Times, 13/7/13] 

August

at least someone's protecting us

Syria Crisis.  Like we didn't have enough to worry about.  Britain deploys 6 Typhoon fighter jets to RAF Akrotiri.  Within days, Assad responds with his own fighter jets in a 'goad-and-probe' sortie near Famagusta.  Two of the British Typhoons were scrambled to see them off, and Turkey got jittery too, sending out two F16s.  The Syrians retreated, but not without blowing a couple of raspberries first.  In Larnaca Bay, a French warship is anchored for several days, then glides quietly away.

September

is it a film, a book or a song?

The new whizzkid, finance minister Haris Georgiades, announces that all restrictions imposed in March on the flow of capital will be lifted by early 2014 ... except in the case of transfers abroad.  [Umm, so that's not all then.]  Up to now account holders at the now defunct Laiki Bank have been shunted along to the Bank of Cyprus, but are not allowed to move their money to any other bank on the island or abroad.  The EU and the IMF release the second installment of the 10 billion euro bailout package.  Meanwhile, municipal, church-run and private food banks feed the starving - reportedly now a sixth of the population.  Unemployment spikes.  Local businesses close their doors, leaving bills and rents unpaid.  Town centres turn into ghost towns of empty shops.  


October

get your bargains here... so cheap they're invisible!

Anastasiades shelves plans to pass a new law slashing all commercial and residential rents, citing legal red tape.  Syria meets its deadline to destroy or render inoperable its chemical weapons facilities.  One welfare services department in Nicosia is threatened with a bomb (a hoax).  Cyprus Airways shells out more than 420K euro to Hermes Airports, after a row between the airport authority and the airline over unpaid debts.  And another row erupts between the Cyprus government and the UN over  'Downergate'.    


November

the nation weeps

The 94-year-old former president Glafkos Clerides dies and the government announces three days of public mourning.  Anastasiades breathes a sigh of relief as he can now take a break from all the awkward questions pesky journalists keep asking him.  Much was made of Clerides's great statesmanship, his wartime heroism, and his valiant but ultimately unsuccessful efforts over decades to unify a divided island.  After 3 days everybody forgot about him.  Bram, the Great Dane dog who was going to be euthanised, was saved following a social media appeal.  


December 2013

And here we are!  What a year of achievements for Cyprus!  The icing on the cake is that Cyprus officially has the lowest educational standards in Europe, according to the OECD/PISA report in which even Romanian kids do better.  The other good news is that there's been a significant drop in the number of fatal road accidents this year, probably because nobody can afford the petrol.  But we can look forward to a new year of growth, prosperity, stability, legality and state efficiency because after all, the only way forward from here is up.  

Happy New Year, folks!  


O sacred and adorable Trinity, hear our prayers on behalf of our Holy Father, Pope Francis, our bishops, our clergy, and for all that are in authority over us.  Bless, we beseech Thee, during the coming year, the whole Catholic Church, convert heretics and unbelievers, soften the hearts of sinners so that they may return to Thy friendship.  Give prosperity to our country and peace among nations of the world.  Pour down Thy blessings upon our friends, relatives, and acquaintances, and upon our enemies, if we have any.  Assist the poor and the sick.  Have pity on the souls of those whom this year has taken from us, and do Thou be merciful to those who during the coming year will be summoned before Thy judgement seat.  May all our actions be preceded by Thy inspirations, and carried on by Thy assistance, so that all our prayers and works, having begun in Thee, may likewise be ended through Thee.  Amen.  

Stone me!

A Nicosia lawyer is suing the Cyprus government over her “constitutional right” to grow and smoke cannabis, according to the Cyprus Daily (print edition, p. 21).

The 35-year-old claims she suffers from work-related stress [it’s tough being a lawyer in this country ... so much work] that can only be relieved by smoking weed.

She also argues that cannabis is a sacred plant in “many” religions and that she needs to smoke it in order to achieve “spiritual fulfillment”. 

Maybe she's a Rastafarian Cypriot.  

The lawyer took up her case after her home was raided in 2012 by drug squad officers, who found half a gram of cannabis in her possession. (That’s just about enough for one joint.)  

She may have been stoned when filing her lawsuit.  Or possibly work is a bit slow for her at the moment. 

Under Cyprus law cannabis is classed as an illegal Class B narcotic.  The penalty for cannabis use in Cyprus may be life imprisonment, while possession (without use) can fetch up to 8 years’ imprisonment, or up to 2 years for a first offence of an under 25-year-old, although in practice, first offenders receive only a caution.  Possession of 3 plants or more or 30 grams or more is deemed as intention to supply. 

This year, Uruguay became the first country in the world to fully legalise the sale, production and distribution of marijuana as of April 2014.  In Iran, its cultivation is legal if planted for food purposes – the Iranian people eat the seeds.  Despite this, cannabis cultivation and use in Iran remain low.

Across the EU, marijuana is illegal, although laws regarding personal use vary.  In the Netherlands, it is effectively decriminalised and sold openly in “coffee” shops. 

If the Nicosia woman wins her case, my uncle’s an aunt. 

I didn’t inhale.

- Bill Clinton

Who is man's best friend's best friend?

In the Middle Ages, men convicted of high treason in England were hanged, drawn and quartered.  

Cyprus is still in the Middle Ages in its treatment of animals.  

A 64-year-old Limassol man has been charged with animal cruelty after allegedly tying his dog to the back of his car and dragging it through the streets until it died, the CM reports.  

The man was released on bail.  

from Avaaz.org

Sign this petition to the President of Cyprus, Mr. Anastasiades, to establish an animal police unit in Cyprus and bring all animal abusers to rightful justice.  

More than 10,000 have already signed.  

Added 29/12/13 - the petitioner recently changed his/her profile pic to this:

from Avaaz.org

https://secure.avaaz.org/en/petition/President_of_Cyprus_Nikos_Anastasiades_Timoria_ston_64hrono_poy_skotose_ton_skylo_toy_stin_LemesoDimioyrgia_APZ/?cJzrhbb

The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated. 
- Mahatma Gandhi  

If the world hate you, know ye, that it hath hated me before you

Two bombs in Christian areas of the Iraqi capital, Baghdad, killed 35 people or more on Christmas Day yesterday, according to the BBC.

Stoning of St. Stephen
attributed to Luigi Garzi (1638-1721)

One bomb killing 11 people exploded in an outdoor market in a mainly Christian neighbourhood, followed shortly after by a bomb outside St. John's Catholic Church, just as Christmas Day worshippers were leaving the church, killing another 24.  

On the Feast of St. Stephen today, we remember Pope John Paul II's Angelus message of 2003:

"The death of the martyr is a birth in Heaven."  

The pontiff reminds us of all Christian communities around the world who suffer persecution because of their faith.  Like St. Stephen, stoned to death outside Jerusalem in the first century AD following false accusations against him, the suffering of Christian martyrs imitates the suffering of Christ.  Their blood shed out of their love of God.  

As Pope Benedict XVI said in his St. Stephen's Day Angelus message of 2006:

"Their death [of the early Christian martyrs] was not a reason for fear and sadness but of spiritual enthusiasm, which always gives rise to new Christians.  For believers, the day of death, and even more so, the day of martyrdom, is not the end of everything, but rather the 'passage' to immortal life, it is the day of the final birth, the 'dies natalis'."

"It is no accident that the Christmas iconography sometimes represents the divine newborn child lying in a small sarcophagus, to indicate that the Redeemer was born to die, He was born to give His life in ransom to all."

Nativity of the Lord
Byzantine icon

Echoed by Pope Francis I in his Angelus message today, appealing on behalf of all Christians who suffer violence, discrimination and injustice.  Nevertheless, he said Christians ought not to be surprised by such mistreatment, since Jesus said such things would happen.

It is this consistency in the Church throughout the papacies and throughout the ages from the beginning of the Christian era from which we derive stability, comfort and hope. 

Without the spiritual dimension, Christmas is reduced to just another "holiday", an excuse for shopping, gluttony and parties.  That, too, is a form of discrimination against Christ - an attempt to distort Christ's birth into something without Him.  A more subtle form of the marginalisation of Christianity but not so different to the oppression of Christian worship in Iraq, elsewhere in the Middle East, North Africa, China and Indonesia.  

Even Britain is heading down the perilous road of banning or diminishing Christmas, e.g. in 2002, the British Red Cross ordered its 430 charity shops nationwide to remove all Christmas decorations from its shop windows in case they were "offensive" to Muslims.  

The irony is that one of the excuses for the Second Iraq War in 2003 was to impose the "superior" values of Western "civilised democracy" upon them.  Well, that went well.  

Marketplace in the Doura district of Baghdad
Christmas Day 2013
Channel 4 news photo

This morning, the BBC Radio 4's Thought for Day slot on the Today programme invited an atheist to broadcast his 'faith', (he kept saying he didn't have one), despite previous assurances from the BBC that the traditional 50-year-long, daily religious slot would not be hijacked by the humanist/secularist/atheist brigade.  The politically correct, right-on BBC has been under lobbying pressure for some time to include an "alternative" Thought for the Day by non-religious speakers.  They got round it by having two.  Cop-out.  

St. Stephen's Day without remembering St. Stephen and Christmas without including Christ is like trying to build a house without builders.  A house of cards that will eventually collapse.  

O Great St. Stephen, the scriptures tell us that your face was like an angel's as you witnessed to the truth of Christ.  Please ask the Holy Trinity to fill my soul and the souls of all my brothers and sisters throughout the world with a deep hunger for the truth that comes from the heart of Jesus, and also with the loving courage to embrace and profess the truth even amid difficulties, confusion and persecution.  May the serenity and peace which were yours at the hour of your stoning be ours as well as we wait in hope for the coming of the Lord Jesus, who lives and reigns forever and ever.  Amen. 

Happy Christmas!

Footsteps wishes all our readers a very joyous and blessed Christmas.

O Holy Night!  

Chumps of the week

200 kilograms of air mail destined for Cyprus via Athens are missing, according to Peter Stevenson in the CM today.  

Chief postal superintendent of Cyprus, Pavlos Pavlides, said: "either the mail was misplaced or put on the wrong plane".  

Isn't that the same thing?  

Nobody seems to know where the missing mail bags are.  

"We would like to apologise to everyone who is expecting mail," [yes, it is Christmas] "despite it not being our fault," Pavlides said.  

Of course it's not the Cyprus PO's fault!  Why break the habit of a lifetime and claim responsibility for anything?  Just blame it on Athens.  

Chumps of the week.  It's an honour really.  

Fortitudo Dei, St. Gabriel the Archangel, the greatest of messengers.  

All the world's a stage

You know you’re getting older when the last time you went clubbing it was called a disco. 

Age alert.

The CM’s arts editor gave me a good laugh on Thursday (print edition, p. 19):

“Ladies and gents, are you ready for Marco Da Silva? [who?]  “You’ve most likely seen him in music videos or on the cover of magazines.”  [Err, no]  “Perhaps you were lucky enough to have seen him dancing on tour with Kylie Minogue" [no again] "Yes that’s him, the really hot dancer with the awesome tatts.”  [nobody says ‘awesome’ in Europe, dear CM, and tatts are simply chav]  “However you know him [we don’t], get ready to take your relationship a step further...” [relationship???]

Oh dear.  This is the level of entertainment in Larnaca.  It might be a bit better in Nicosia or Limassol (we hope), but poor old Larnaca gets left with the dross, while the CM tries to big up a “famous” choreographer, dancer, model and DJ [performing] "exclusively in Cyprus"  [exclusive because nobody else wanted him].  Don’t get me wrong, Mr. Da Silva, I’ve got nothing against you or your, umm, dee-jaying/modelling achievements, but let’s not pretend this is high art.  

Please, Mr. Mayor Andreas Louroujatis, may we have some decent entertainment in Larnaca for a change, other than the usual vraka dancers at Phinikoudes?  We know the country’s broke, but if Cyprus can afford Russian missiles and Israeli gunboats, then surely we could get Andrea Bocelli? 

Harrumph.  Bah, humbug.  

In the mean time, we have to content ourselves with YouTube.  

Patron saint of musicians:  Saint Cecilia