Air-raid sirens
July 20, 2007Today is 33rd anniversary of the Turkish invasion of Cyprus. Although we knew the anniversary was around this time, the exact date (or even today’s date for that matter) wasn’t firm in our minds.
Around this time last year we had dinner with some friends from England who were over on holiday. As we picked them up from their hotel and drove to the restaurant there was general small-talk about how they were enjoying the holiday and the island. Apparently everything was good, but they’d been woken that early that morning by air-raid sirens and had no idea what was going on.
As well as being near terrified, until the hotel reassured them that this was an annual event to mark the anniversary of the invasion, they also commented just how loud the sirens were. For whatever reason we hadn’t heard the sirens that morning and since it was our first July on the island hadn’t heard them in previous years.
This morning, just after 5.30am we remembered that conversation. For the record the Arradippou sirens are LOUD, particularly at that time in the morning. Must put a note in the diary to wear ear-plugs this time next year!
In the meantime this morning’s wake-up call was an interesting reminder of the island’s politics and history. The link in the top paragraph is to a Wikipedia article on the subject. Even that is considered contentious but does give a broad overview of the history for those who are interested to know more.
Aradippou Tales - A Life in Cyprus 
Hope you guys are well. We often have people coming to your part of the world , let me know if you ever need things, prefer if this was not likely to be imponded or attact a prison sentence !!
Love to you both.
Thanks Peter, we wouldn’t ask for anything that might be impounded either!
I’ll update you directly.
Ian
[…] This previous blog post has some links to the background on the issue. Explore posts in the same categories: cyprus, Politics, Life […]