Secret Appetites

As I’m slim, people assume I don’t eat or am anorexic. Truth is that I don’t like eating much in front of people. It’s my thing. I’ve just always found it too... personal and I only enjoy food when am with good friends rather than alongside strangers (who I often find have the strangest eating habits). The upside is that people think I have pristine table manners as I bring the fork to my mouth about three times during the whole dinner. Truth is I inhale food like an alcoholic guzzles booze. But it’s what we do in private that reveals who we truly are. In which case I have an endless appetite and am constantly hungry, although most assume I give my food away to the next person.

But like everyone else, I have habits. And when it comes to food I am particularly fussy. I have been kosher for over 2 years and only eat three type of meats; beef, chicken and turkey and two types of fish; salmon and tuna. Yet, my eating habits are strange. Before bed I always make a hot chocolate (winter) or milkshake (summer) and eat Pringles in bed. I can never be without any Pringles in the house. It’s like running out of toilet paper! Only more important, as there is always… well… the newspaper!

I never eat spicy foods (refer to above section where loo roll is not priority – that’s why!); pepper is spice to me and will avoid even a sprinkling of it – I doubt I even have some at home. I can eat honey and yogurt by the truckload, as I can with salads although I will never touch onion in the off chance that I kiss someone that afternoon.

But my worst habit is not cooking. And its not that I can’t cook, it’s that I can’t work up the interest of learning to cook. I’d rather clean. Although as I am writing this now, I am starving and hating the idea of cleaning my apartment this afternoon! Maybe I’ll go to a psistaria.

On why I hate the suburbs (again)

I hate the suburbs. I go there as rarely as possible and when I do it’s usually driving through them to get to the beach. You see, the suburbs in Limassol aren’t that bad – as they are filled with mansions and have sea views. In Nicosia, they are filled with roads that confuse you. Ok, so not all are bad, Makedonitissa is nice and Engomi is perhaps my favourite place in Nicosia. Aglantzia is a city suburb with its own centre, Skali and Plati and Latsia feels more like another city completely. But other than that the suburbs suck. I avoid Lakatamia like the plague and every time I hear the word Strovolo my heart skips a beat (unless I am in Acropolis, but as the name suggests I am in the ‘edge of the city’). I’m sorry. I know this must be rude to those who live in the suburbs; especially the outer suburbs but it might as well be outer Mongolia. It is so far to get to, there is nothing in it and it’s depressing. It’s just a row of houses. Maybe every now and then you chance upon a place of interest, like Jumbo or Pavilion but… there is nothing. True, Nicosia is not the most beautiful city on the planet, but at least everything happens in the centre. In the suburbs, people get desperate, even the Nicosia Housewife is thinking of buying an apartment in the CC (penthouse of course) where it will be easier for her to do her shopping. But that means not having a pool, which is a big sacrifice.

I don’t know, maybe it’s just me, but I much prefer the city to the suburbs, although I hear that in the suburbs…

Summer 2009: DC, Philly, NYC, Boston, LDN

Washington DC, Philadelphia, NYC, Boston, London...
...and that's why I've been Missing in Action

Ordering Coffee... oooof!

Me: Hi, I’d like a coffee

Barista: What type?

Me: What type do you have?

Barista: Frappe, latte, frappe-latte, frappecino mix, frappecino-cappucino-mix, macchiato, frappecino, cino, soda-cino, whiskey-cino, water-cino, water-cino with extra water

Me: What’s the difference between a frappe and a frappecino-mix

Barista: The frappecino-mix is mixed, the frappe isn’t. Duh!

Me: Erm… I’ll have a frappecino-mix please

Barista: Hot, cold, lukewarm, mild, wild, freakishly-cold or so hot it can burn your lips off?

Me: Tough one, but as it’s summer I’ll go for a cold frappe

Barista: Cold-cold, extra-cold, regular-cold, freezing-cold, snow-cold or warm-cold?

Me: Erm… normal cold please

Barista: Size?

Me: Erm… what do you have?

Barista: Grande, super, large, medium, small, medium-small, shot or 3.5 litres

Me: Erm... Grande please

Barista: Grande-grande, super-grande, medium-grande, extra-grande, regular-grande, small-grande?

Me: Okay... what’s the difference between grand-grande and medium-grande, isn’t that just a large?

Barista (looking at me as if I told her that her mother had a tail): There is a big different between grande-grande, medium-grande and large. Medium-grande is slightly less grande than grande-grande and a little more grande but not much than large.

Me: Phew. Well… okay, I’ll take a grande-grande I guess

Barista: With what?

Me: What does it come with?

Barista: Ice, extra-ice, extra-low-fat-ice, cream, whipped cream, low-fat cream, regular-cream, cherries

Me: Is there a difference between ice and extra-ice?

Barista (looking at me as if I just said her father is a cross-dresser): There is a big difference between ice and extra-ice in your grande-grande frappecino-mix than if you had less ice.

Me: Okay I’ll have extra-ice then please.

Barista: Anything to eat?

Me: What do you have?

Protaras Baby!

So I went to Protaras for the second time in my life last weekend. I loved Protaras. I think it’s great. Like a mini Limassol just for fun, or perhaps it’s more like Nicosia-by-the-sea and classier English tourists (the trashy kind go to Napa). Anyway, Protaras is fun, even the pavements are fun!

But because it’s fun it’s also busy. So busy in fact that you need to get up at the a$$-crack of dawn just to get a bed by the beach. By 9am, if you’re not on the beach and have no bed, you might as well go home and organize your cupboards.

Well, we went out on Saturday and didn’t get back to the hotel until 7am. Everyone wanted to sleep and then go to the beach. I warned them that they would not get up if they slept in the bed and it was better to sleep on the beach like all normal party-people but no one heeded my warnings (and believe me, I know about these things, I used to be an international party boy). But the were asleep without even having finished my sentence.

At 12pm we head to the beach and stand there staring with our mouths gapping, except me who was trying not to smirk. The only people who can navigate Protaras (even better than people from Protaras) are Nicosians. In fact, I think Nicosia should become another municipality of Nicosia, it’s the Capital-by-the-Coast. I was with Lemesians, and I swear to you, Limassol people are only good for communing in Limassol. I hate it when my Limassol friends get lost in Nicosia; they have more chances of finding their destination in the Labyrinth of the Minotaur. So you can imagine dealing with Lemesians in Protaras who have no clue of where anything is (excluding the beach- and that’s only because they know what it looks like, having a beach in LMS) but think they do.

‘What? No bed?’ was the response. We scoured Fig Tree Bay (FTB) for beds but you couldn’t even find one. People actually went to the shops to buy umbrellas. Then we went to the one next to FTB, is it called Sunrise? Whatever it is called, there were no beds. Surprised? I wasn’t. The others were.

What do you frigging expect at 12pm on a Sunday in June? An empty beach? You personal water-boy? Endless expanse of sand? The sea was packed, and with so many people on the beach you could barely see the colour of the sand.

Chilling out is like everything in life. You have to be organized. If the others wanted a bed so badly, then get up and get one. Don’t go to sleep and expect to find one when you get up. You have to work for it. A bed isn’t going to magically appear. And if you arrive and there is no bed, don’t moan. You didn’t think, then you need to deal with it. I then suggested sitting by the pool but the others went for the golden beaches of Protaras. They certainly got it, all because they didn’t bother.

I had a great weekend, but by the end of it I was sick of the sea and wanted the pool (most Lemesians go to the pool; the only people in Cyprus who enjoy and appreciate the beach are Nicosians). Anyway, I left at 3pm just before traffic. When I got home, I experienced that warm feeling when you’re away for (what feels like ) a long time; when you’re back in your habitat, surrounded in your comfort zone, with your personal belongings and wrapped in silence. The blinds were drawn, the house was quiet and it was nice to sit there on the balcony with lemonade and fruit – doing nothing but enjoying the moment (and then reading a magazine; Nitro with Vissi on the cover). I had a good time in Protaras but I was so happy to be back in Nicosia. I missed my newly adopted city and I missed sitting in a real bed, minus sand – even if it is golden and soft.

Screaming Baby // Shhh... I'm eating Sushi!

So what do you do when a baby is bawling in a restaurant? I was a enjoying a delightful sushi meal with the Nicosia Housewife the other day when this baby started screaming its head off. The parents did nothing. There wasn’t even a Yiayia around to deal with it (because we all know many ‘modern’ Cypriot parents don’t blink an eyelid). Everyone was put off by this baby’s screaming. Even my sushi turned sour. The restaurant did nothing. If I had ordered spaghetti I would have flicked it at them from across the restaurant, but it was sushi and throwing sushi at irresponsible parents is akin to sacrilege – you never throw sushi away!

But what surprised me was that the management did nothing. Nothing? Yes. Nothing. When I worked in a bar in Manchester, we got three women, come in one Sunday afternoon, drunk/stoned/high/ or all three. They did not stop laughing and cracking jokes and literally howling in their seats. I thought they were hilarious. Everyone else hated them. My boss got so upset with them that he told them to be quite. They were for a bit and then they left. Maybe to get another hit.

Why do not that with the family and their screaming-baby? Because they are worried that they’ll leave? What about the rest of the customers then?

Disputed Art

The British Museum’s argument is that the Parthenon Marbles can be viewed as part of the world civilization whereas in Athens only as Athenian civilization. However the reason for seeing the Marbles as part of a discourse on the world’s various civilizations is because the British Museum has various artifacts from all over the world; due to colonization. Yet this argument is redundant, thanks to globalization. Tourism is a phenomenon of globalization; and as more people pour into Athens they would be able to see the whole Frieze in the context it came from. To see part of Marble in Athens juxtaposed alongside pieces of Rome and Egypt may lend a momentary insight into what the world has produced in terms of art and civilization but it is completely out of scope and context - especially when you leave the museum and step into the London drizzle.