100 years Kataklysmos: from local customs to tacky plastic! - Paula Manoli-Gray

It is that time of year again… the time of year when Larnaca takes the spotlight and is the epicentre of Kataklysmos celebrations. The time of year that people from all over the island flock to our seafront and every inch of parkable – and non-parkable space is taken up.

So, what do you think of our Festival of the Flood celebrations? They keep going strong, and we actually celebrate 100 years this year! That is pretty amazing, but I don't tend to go anymore.

When I was a teenager, it was indeed the highlight of my year as we (the teens of the time!) would love the bumper cars on the beach and spent most of the time at the fairground on the sands.  I would walk from my parents' home in Drosia, so parking wasn't an issue, and we really did enjoy the whole atmosphere. People would really dress up for it in their finest and walk up and down the promenade people-watching, like they used to in the villages when my dad was a teenager and the Sunday 'peripato' (walk) to see the opposite sex was the highlight of the youth's week!

As I got older the festival started to lose its shine for me. I am not sure if it was the frustration as a driver of not being able to enter the town centre or park, or if the stalls have become increasingly tacky. Fast forward to today, and I don't take my kids in the evening at all for two reasons 1) It is so packed that I become claustrophobic pushing through the crowds and fear I will lose them, and 2) they just want to buy the dodgy-quality rubbish at the stalls and make my life very difficult when I say 'no'.

Granted, the entertainment is good and eagerly anticipated. A lot of planning goes into it and elements of the old traditions, such as the improved rhyming matches of 'Chatista' still take place, but still… I just don't feel it anymore.

The addition of uniform, white tents of recent years is also nice and gives the place a much tidier look - so it is not reminiscent of a gypsy carnival - but the stalls are still not of the greatest standard and as is the case every year, whatever one stall has, the rest have too – all from the same supplier so it is very 'samey'.

And with times changing, there is no longer the thrill of buying music cassette tapes! The stalls selling mix tapes and really, really good copies of international artist's tapes were one of the highlights of my youth! But I do give the 'lokmathes' (honey dough balls) and traditional fruit and nut stalls a thumbs-up, as well as the kiosks of local crafts (my favourite bit) as they are representative of our customs and culture.

As for the people-watching, folks still walk up and down the promenade constantly with no real purpose, but as we are living in a time when people either dress up or down all the time depending on their personality, there is no definition of 'special occasion' wear, so there isn't that pride of having dolled up for the event.

Don't get me wrong… I am all for maintaining traditions and having our own cultural events that form part of Larnaca's identity, and I love the whole atmosphere of it all, but I don't equate that to struggling to park, just so my kids can buy a fake Minion/Smurf/Super Mario stuffed toy!

First appeared in The Cyprus Weekly newspaper 29/05/15

Fun Factory Summer School

Russian Summer School

English programme for Kataklysmos events.

Paupers in castles - Paula Manoli-Gray

We recently celebrated my daughter's birthday with a children's party at our home, and just as we did in March for my son, we invited school friends and their parents, many of whom we had not met before.

And whilst I love holding parties in my home, in the run-up to the 'event' I started to panic about how my abode would appear to those who have not seen it before. And to be honest, it looks pretty darn shocking…

It's not because we are filthy and live like savages (oh who am I kidding, I have two children, so there is never a 'tidy' moment in it), but because as is typical for a house built in Cyprus, it needs constant maintenance or looks completely rundown.

We bought our house 11 years ago from a developer who was building a row of six houses, and are still waiting for our deeds (another, different issue…) I know there are many, many horror stories that range from shoddy workmanship to downright criminal building negligence, but we were lucky to have my Cypriot father visiting every day and moaning at the builders to get things right. Had he not been on their case, I can't imagine how many more issues we would have on top of the ones we have now - the ones that make us look like we live in a house about to be bulldozed with the amount of cracks and pieces falling off!

I am acutely aware that Cypriots are very, very house proud and that many of them are particular with maintaining their homes and keeping them spic and span, hence why I start having palpitations when they turn up at mine for a kid's party and see a house that looks like a) it has been vomited on by a juvenile art fairy (that would be the children's artwork covering the cracks in the wall and the garish colours to make it a cheerful home for them), and b) it is just about ready to fall down on their heads (it isn't, but it sure looks rather sorry for itself). On top of that, our cesspit is far too shallow (another building blunder), and being that we live on a slope, fills up with the waste of all six houses, thus overflowing constantly and costing us a fortune to empty frequently. This is on top of the badly installed water pipes that have caused countless problems, the shower that was not sealed that led to major ceiling damage in the living room, and the cemented electricity pipes. Just a selection of the 'quality' work performed on our significant investment.

And yet, I think we have got off lightly compared to some of the problems I hear from other people. I have one friend who bought a property in Tersefanou who has literally abandoned it as it is a train wreck that won't get rectified by the developer, and is just too much stress and hassle to seek justice for. A very sad situation.

So why is our building industry in such a shambles? Does the nature of our climate condemn our houses to the kind of decay we witness - just as the dust condemns us to a ridiculous level of housework, or is our construction industry too lax? I simply can't understand how we have not yet worked out a method to build houses and pavements that will not start to crack and crumble almost instantly… how do they do it everywhere else in the world?

And so with so much maintenance being needed in our particular home, we just end up looking like paupers living in a castle!

First appeared in The Cyprus Weekly, 22/05/15