Home Truths and Nostalgia

The following morning, I emerged slowly from unconsciousness, and found myself taking in the size and shape of my latest temporary lodgings. Spending so much of my life in hotel rooms, I often found it difficult to recall straightaway exactly where I was, and why I was there, on waking up.

The air conditioning had made the slightly familiar surroundings chilly, so I snuggled down under my sheet and blankets to survey the scene in comfort. Peering cautiously from the warmth of my bed, I looked at the thick red velvet curtains stretched across the patio doors. Through chinks in the material streamed glorious, glorious sunshine. The kind of sunshine that Englishmen rarely experience in their own country, even at the height of summer.

I couldn’t resist it. I had to investigate those chinks further. Bracing myself against the incongruous cold, I headed for the patio. As I did so, I felt the sun’s rays splashing onto my oh-so white body. The rays were forcing their way into my room, intent on enlivening its cool dark privacy. As I thrust my fingers into one the chinks, I felt in some ways like the little Dutch boy with his fingers in the dyke, restraining the North Sea’s might.

Then I pulled the curtains apart slightly, to see what effect it might have. Incredible warmth and light gushed into the room, as if I had breached a dam. I succumbed to temptation, the pressure was too much: I threw back the drapes to invite the sun into the room properly. The instant I did so, I experienced a wonderfully heart-warming sensation, so much stronger than the sun lamp or any gym session had provided.

Although it was still early, around seven thirty as I recall, I opened the patio doors next to see some lucky tourists taking their first dip in the sea about a hundred metres away. Perhaps they were trying to soothe the bright red sunburn that I could see glowing on their arms and legs. Perhaps, like me, they were just glad to be in such an exquisite climate.

The only blight on the scene before me was the road between the hotel and the beach: it was alive with traffic, even at this early hour on a Sunday morning. Apart from the hooting taxis and smoky trucks, mopeds zoomed up and down, their young riders seemingly determined to spoil the moment. They were like bumble bees collecting nectar from flowers in full bloom. However, this was no natural and forgivable phenomenon. This was pollution. An ugly, noisy, smelly blot on proceedings that contrasted badly with the sparkling blue sea and the equally blue sky a little way beyond.

Despite the man-made assault on my senses, I ignored what was immediately in front of my eyes and looked longingly into the middle distance. Far above the beach and the sea, I could see an airliner, its fuselage glinting in the sun on its way south to the Arabian Gulf. Yes, this was what I wanted to see, not that dreadful road, or long stretches of the M6 motorway in England. A typical Mediterranean holiday-scene, not life’s normal day-to-day practicalities.

Having closed the double glazed patio doors, I left the curtains open and turned off the air conditioning. I wanted to revel in my first real taste of summer sunshine that year, so I lay diagonally across the bed to maximise my exposure and support. The experience I had that morning was similar to one I’d had some years earlier whilst visiting Baden Baden in Germany, on a business trip one early spring day. It was a feeling of total well being, of utter hope and joy. I felt like a tortoise emerging from its winter hibernation. No, more like a lizard emerging from overnight lethargy. Slowly, slowly, the sun’s rays revived my stiff limbs, I became alive and invigorated. Oh, how my body and mind yearned for this climate.

About half an hour later, feeling super-charged with energy, I rose to take a shower. Afterwards, damper and softer, it became obvious that the clothes I’d laid out the night before were going to be totally unsuitable for the day ahead. Having donned a T-shirt, shorts and a pair of sandals instead, I went in search of a late breakfast. To my dismay, I found the buffet table almost empty.

Picking over the remaining crumbs were some elderly French hikers, who greeted my arrival with noticeable guilt. Performing an admirable impression of a retiring locust swarm, they were devouring everything interest that remained, especially what must once have been a delightful array of fresh strawberries, bananas and oranges. The food that they couldn’t perch on their burgeoning plates, they deposited furtively into knapsacks, to provide free sustenance later in the day.

Whoever said that pensioners don’t eat much? These did, so much in fact that I thought about throwing my pool towel over the buffet table before retiring that night, to reserve my place for Monday morning. It was an impractical whim. This was clearly a free for all, a straightforward scoffing activity, where only the fittest survived. I learnt my lesson. For the rest of my stay, no one beat me to the breakfast buffet table.

With just a glass of orange juice and a slice of toast inside me on that very special Sunday morning, I strolled starry-eyed towards my intended employer’s premises. Only a heavily scented jasmine plant near my hotel, and the awful smelling zoo further on, intruded on my delirium. Pausing briefly, I tried to catch a glimpse of the imprisoned animals. I couldn’t see much from the road, but a German tourist waiting for a bus told me that he’d been inside and it wasn’t a place for animal lovers to visit. Apparently, the solitary elephant was showing signs of odd behaviour caused, in his opinion, by the pen being too small and a lack of mental stimulation offered by plain concrete walls. He was concerned about the amount of shade the animal had too and, from standing talking to him in full sunshine that morning, I could tell how that might be important.

I didn’t linger. I didn’t want to know about negative things really. I wanted to see the ‘palace’ where I might soon be working soon. The palace was taking some finding though. I scoured the seafront for over an hour, dodging ill-placed ‘street furniture’, ducking under unkempt tree branches (that must have provided local eye surgeons with excellent business) and diving past two metre deep mantraps. I was looking for the ‘prestigious offices overlooking Limassol’s sea front’ as stated in the chairman’s brochure, but even the locals couldn’t pinpoint the address. Eventually, I found the entrance to the multi-storey offices tucked up a side street.

Excavations of Limassol’s pavements and roads were common in 1994. A few were intentional, to bury or re-bury new sewer pipes, which explained most of the man and tank traps that I found. Clearly, the sewer project hadn’t reached this side street though, since its potholes were relatively shallow, and the stench of human excrement was immense. In fact, the smell coming from the zoo was sweet by comparison. Holding my breath and clenching a fresh handkerchief over my mouth and nose, I carried out a closer inspection of the entrance. In the foyer, I found a cesspit access point and further awful signs that it needed immediate attention, which I won’t describe any further.

Unfortunately, the nauseating smell complemented fully the down-at-heel appearance of the entrance. My current employer, so particular about customer perception and high standards in all matters, would have fainted had he been there - and not just from the smell. In that awful moment, reality slapped my face hard and suddenly. My dream was rapidly becoming a nightmare. Stunned and shocked, I staggered away from the foyer, literally.

What happened in the next few minutes is still unclear to this day, but I recall regaining my senses about five hundred metres away, near the shoreline where fresh sea air mingled more freely with the coast road’s exhaust fumes. I found myself still reeling from what had been a very nasty experience, one that was likely to change everything. What I smelt and saw that Sunday morning sickened me, literally and metaphorically.

In retrospect therefore, it was probably a good thing that I hadn’t filled my stomach at breakfast. Otherwise, I might have embarrassed myself in front of the many young Philipinos promenading in the sunshine, adorned in their Sunday best clothes. As I recovered slowly from my ordeal, I knew that it wouldn’t be easy to forgive those unfortunate first impressions, so I took a few photographs of the offices from a distance so that I’d never forget the experience.

I returned to my hotel via the shoreline, where fewer obstacles blocked my way, threatened to remove my eyesight and/or engulf me. Somewhere to my left a church bell rang loudly, calling the Catholics within earshot to Mass. How odd, I thought, in a largely Orthodox country. I didn’t have time to investigate further though: soon the corporal would pick me up for my much-anticipated Sunday lunch at Akrotiri and now I needed another shower. What would I tell him about the visit to my employer’s premises that morning? Probably nothing.

At the agreed hour, the corporal blew his car’s horn to signal his arrival. I was sitting on my narrow balcony absorbing some more solar radiation and air pollution, which was just as well since I could only just hear his horn over the din. Closing the sliding glass patio doors and re-entering the air-conditioned splendour of my room, I realised just how many diesel fumes I’d been breathing and how effective the hotel’s double-glazing was at soundproofing. The sudden temperature difference made me feel slightly giddy.

By the time I reached street level, I’d recovered sufficiently from my giddiness to use my rugby side step on a procession of wedding cars rushing along the seafront, horns blaring, ribbons fluttering. This was different to the weddings that Allie and I had experienced in Crete some years earlier, where dodging celebratory bullets fired into the air by drunken guests was an equally absorbing pastime. A Dutch couple said that they went back to the same hotel in Crete every year, despite the Saturday night gunfire and the associated risk to life and limb. Apparently, they’d learnt to go to bed early on wedding nights, having taken plenty of sleeping tablets!

As I opened the corporal’s car door to get in, I scraped the bottom of it on the pavement again, and literally begged his forgiveness. The corporal tolerated my second bought of clumsiness with the same good humour as the first and, fortunately, it didn’t spoil the moment. I was looking forward to our drive to Akrotiri very much because of the memories it would trigger, some vivid, some vague.

The corporal didn’t take a direct route, he wanted to continue the sightseeing tour that he’d begun the previous day. Anyway, lunch wasn’t going to be ready for an hour or so. Consequently, we drove along Makarios Avenue so that I could see the shops and then down Omonia Avenue where most of the car dealers had their showrooms.

Here, the corporal told me about the agreement that he’d struck with one of the dealers. The deal meant that he could drive his new duty-free car for several years in Cyprus and not lose a cent when he sold it back to the dealer on his posting to the UK. Apparently, dealers could sell second-hand cars easily to the general public and that’s why he wasn’t too concerned about me scraping the door. The corporal also said that I should ask for a ‘gizzit’ when I went shopping for cars. Gizzits, literally ‘give-us-its’, were forlorn looking runabouts that dealers lent to entitled customers whilst they decided which duty-free car to buy.

As we passed through the suburb of Zakaki and into the citrus plantations of Phassouri beyond, the corporal pointed out several shops and supermarkets where I could buy reasonable fruit and vegetables and some imported foods. I made written notes accordingly, commenting adversely on their distance out of town. ‘How to reach them without transport?’ I wrote. Clearly, shopping there would entail either a long hot walk or a short expensive taxi ride.

The plantation road was magical. Sunlight streamed through the dense tree canopy, leaving dappled white blotches on the ground. However, the coolness afforded by the trees only really became apparent when we drove through various clearings, like the one at the village of Asomatos. Five minutes later, we emerged from the last of the plantations into full sunlight again, to encounter what I recognised from my RAF days as an ‘aerial farm’, the village of Akrotiri and St. Nicholas’ Monastery.

Apparently, the monks there used to train cats to kill poisonous snakes. I wasn’t sure whether Tiger and Snowy, our beloved cats back home, would take to this work in the heat. The corporal said not to worry, reminding me that encounters with poisonous snakes on the island were rare.

Passing through the checkpoint at RAF Akrotiri was a strange experience. Little had changed in eighteen years, as far as I could tell; 34 Squadron soldiers still stood guard, for example. However, my memory did play tricks on me. For example, I expected to see some mature eucalyptus trees lining our route onto the station, the ones I recall seeing from the back of a ‘four-ton’ lorry all those years ago. The corporal told me that the trees I was thinking about were probably further on, alongside the Officers’ Mess. Equally, they may have been cut down some years earlier.

A few minutes later, we arrived at the corporal’s married quarter. On stopping, I opened the door carefully to avoid the curb and immediately screwed up my eyes to counter the sun’s midday brightness. I’d left my sunglasses back in the hotel. Consequently, I scurried quickly into the corporal’s bungalow to say my hellos. It was then that the heat struck me, for there was very little breeze. There being no air conditioning in the quarter either, the corporal offered me the next best thing: an ice-cold can of imported beer from his drinks’ fridge. Knowing that I was a rugby fan, he then switched on the television and we shared the surreal experience of watching New Zealand play England in the mud, while we endured twenty odd degrees of coarse, dry heat.

I’d forgotten about the British Forces’ Broadcasting Service (BFBS). The only time I’d watched its broadcasts before was when I was serving with, or attached to, various army units in Germany in the early days of British Forces’ television. The corporal said that I could receive the channel in Limassol, but that I’d need a suitable aerial and an effective signal booster. This was good news. It meant that we’d be able to see quality British television as well as the local fare I’d already tasted in my hotel room.

Bored with men’s rugby talk about ‘forward dominance’ and ‘scissor moves’, the corporal’s wife enquired whether I had children, and what my wife ‘did for a living’. After my replies, she reminded me that the Service Children’s Education Authority (SCEA) ran excellent schools on the island. She also told me that Episkopi Garrison, my billet as a young TA soldier, had both primary and secondary schools whereas RAF Akrotiri only had a primary. She went on to ask her husband whether I might be entitled to use these facilities, with me being ex-Service. He didn’t know, but I was determined to find out; good schooling and housing were pivotal to the success of our venture; my friend had said so in England.

Sunday lunch at Akrotiri was excellent and all that I’d hoped for; pork rather than beef, but that didn’t matter. After helping with the washing-up, I sat in the garden talking to my new friends and soaking up a few more rays. I doubt whether as a young army or air force officer, I would have spoken to an ‘other rank’ and his wife with so much honesty and openness about my hopes and worries. Back then, it might have made me vulnerable. Fortunately, I’d banished such concerns on leaving commissioned service. Since then, I’d tried to treat everyone equally, irrespective of their ‘rank’. At this particular time in my life, I didn’t mind these kind people knowing some of my frailties.

The corporal’s neighbours called round mid-afternoon. As we discussed at length a once familiar lifestyle, and how little it had changed over the years, I sipped several glasses of ice-cold squash. The neighbours talked of wonderful things: canoe and horse riding expeditions, open-air swimming pools, Families’ Clubs, British food at the Navy, Army and Air Force Institute (NAAFI) supermarket and parcels from home via the Forces’ postal service. All I could hope was that we’d be entitled to enjoy some of these benefits too, if I took the chairman’s job.

As the corporal drove me back to Limassol through the plantations, the mesmerising aroma of orange blossom struck me. I was entranced once again, and wanted more than ever to live in this exotic paradise. To do this, I couldn’t leave things to chance, so I scribbled down some more reminders in my little notebook. One was to contact the SCEA schools at Episkopi and Akrotiri during the week. I wanted the very best education for my children, and hoped that Angie might find some work there too. Once again, I gazed metaphorically at an apparently exhilarating future.

Safely back in my hotel room, and full of appreciation for the corporal’s kindness, I closed my eyes and summoned memories of Episkopi Garrison, in particular the aptly named ‘Dodge City’. In my mind’s eye, I could see streets lined with wooden shacks, each with tin-roofed verandas to cheat the sun. Perhaps having had a bit too much sun that day, soon my imagination was running wild. I could see horses tethered to the veranda rails, in true wild-west fashion. Their riders were wearing brimmed hats, leather boots and spurs, and were strolling to the barber’s shop, general store and bank.

In reality, these horses were Land Rovers and Ferret armoured cars, and their riders’ were British cavalrymen of the mid-nineteen seventies. On realising this, the scene changed suddenly and I found myself in the anteroom of Episkopi’s Officers’ Mess. My ears were filled with laughter, fanciful banter and tales of bravado. Some of the warriors there were telling me what ‘good sport’ they’d had riding up to the Green Line, with the aim of drawing small arms fire. The resulting battle scars on their Ferrets were the modern equivalent of Red Indian scalps. Many of these ‘war stories’ were the result of too many brandy sour cocktails, and military links between bravery and promotion. The infantry officers, as I recall, poured scorn on many of the cavalry’s yarns.

As I lay on my bed waiting for sleep, with happy fantasies and recollections subsiding, I knew that I wanted to see the ‘bright lights’ of Dodge City again one day soon. Was the tailor’s shop still there, I wondered? Did he still alter uniforms almost free of charge, make made-to-measure suits overnight and sell cheap leather coats? Were the garrison’s gymnasium and volleyball courts where I remembered them to be? Up the hill, near the barrack blocks and petrol supply point. Did squads of fit lean soldiers still march in double quick time to physical training in the mornings?

On the other hand, I knew that I didn’t want to see Dodge again, for experience had taught me that sometimes it’s best to leave fond memories undisturbed. How would I feel if the place in reality didn’t live up to my romantic notions? What if the ‘City’ had gone completely and been replaced by a more functional concrete jungle of the type that I’d seen at Protaras some years earlier?

I couldn’t bear thinking about Episkopi any more, and not being able to find out the answers to my many questions. I wouldn’t be able to go there during my week-long reconnaissance anyway. Even if I could overcome the security restrictions, the base was twenty or so kilometres out of town. With little spare time in my itinerary and no access to transport, a nostalgic visit was out of the question.