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‘I don’t do brooms, I do revolution’
Aliki Hadjigeorgiou met Loukia (in a church, quite randomly) about 12 years ago, shortly after the publication of her first book. Aliki and Loukia – even their names are near-mirror-images of each...
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Wide-open vibes of a hippy Ukrainian trio
All the Same are having orange-and-pomegranate juice at Hoi Polloi in north Nicosia when a 200-lira note (about €6) appears on the cobbled street beside them. Obviously it doesn’t just ‘appear’ – but...
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From war zones to Cyprus
Two very different men with vaguely similar surnames haunt the living room of Sarah Dawoodi’s house in Avgorou. “Know only that which makes the unknown known,” wrote Rumi, the 13th-century Tajik poet....
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Will you change your life?
It could happen to anybody. Although those with a family history of Parkinson Disease (PD) are at a higher risk, a risk that is quite substantial as its prevalence has doubled over the last 25 years...
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A messenger from Cyprus’ depths
Sakis Lazarides doesn’t live in Nicosia (or even Cyprus). That’s just where we happen to meet, at the Arabica Coffee House in a nondescript corner of the capital – which, in turn, happens to be across...
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Celebrating the joy in laundry
Kids do it constantly, at least till they become jaded teenagers. ‘Look!’ they’ll exclaim, ‘A dog!’, pointing at a rocky protuberance (that does look a bit like a dog’s snout) or a thicket of twigs at...
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In Lebanon ‘we always find a way’
Furen is the name of the place – situated right on Eleftheria Square, the most prominent location in all Nicosia – offering “a real taste of Lebanon”. But which Lebanon? The war-torn country currently...
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‘That could easily be me trying to cross the sea’
“The fact that you’re essentially dealing with people that are facing your own trauma or the trauma that your parents experienced means that every day, it’s like I’m trying to support my mother and...
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When it comes to art, he’s a prodigy
The little boy doesn’t hesitate once. He’s only 10 years old – the video was shot in Kakopetria in 2015 – but the piece of charcoal flies across the paper, adding lines at lightning speed: straight...
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Cyprus tradition given a twist
They’ve got 20.6k followers on Instagram. They’re identical twins and they’ve got a contagious passion for food. Katerina and Georgia Fella, known as The Fella Twins, have an impressive and influential...
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‘People are queueing up to do this job’
There are times, admits George Rotos, when he’ll run into someone he knows and pretend not to see them – not because he doesn’t want to talk to them but the opposite, because he doesn’t want to put...
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‘All the obstacles we have, they don’t last forever’
For a while, this article on Swami Jyothirmayah – and the three-day course he conducted at the Indian High Commission in Nicosia a couple of weeks ago – was lacking only one thing: Swami Jyothirmayah....
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‘My dream is to go back’
Sometimes a New Year really is a new year. “It’s a new thing for us,” says Aziz Altaany. “It’s a new thing. We lived 50 years with the same dictator family… It’s a new thing for me to write something...
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The DJ who has bridged Cyprus’ divide for decades
It’s quite an emotional moment, on a Friday evening at Hoi Polloi a few minutes north of the checkpoint. Gifts are brought, as to a visiting dignitary: a Pink Floyd mug, an Iron Maiden key ring, a...
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The handmade cinema of Cyprus
A phone alarm pings, and Adonis Florides gets up. Excuse me, he says briskly, there’s “something I have to do”. I wonder if he needs to take some pill or medication (he’s 65, after all) – but in fact...
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‘Disability is a universal language for peace, tolerance and respect’
Everywhere in the world, two to three babies out of every 1,000 live births will be born with cerebral palsy, described by the World Health Organisation as a complex motor disorder caused by...
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Talking relationships in Cyprus’ ‘sex-negative’ society
On my way to the Oleander Institute – actually to Myrsini’s studio in old Nicosia; the institute has no physical office – I spot a grey-haired couple in their golden years having a big old argument....
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Fearlessness and disorder in old Nicosia
Antonis Koupparis shows me videos on his phone. The clips are mostly CCTV footage, plus videos he shot himself: a low-res litany of crime and disorder in the walled city of Nicosia. “This is me finding...
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Cyprus’ dominatrix: ‘I don’t get undressed’
‘This is all legal, right?’ I ask Jenna (aka Miss Jenna Linn), sitting at Bean Bar in central Nicosia where her appearance has already drawn an appraising, not entirely approving look from our...
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Cyprus rules the world
I’m afraid we have no answer to explain what happened in Peru last August, at the World Athletics U20 Championships. That was the event where 19-year-old Iosif Kesidis won gold in the men’s hammer...
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