Sometimes some things strike me as really odd; I mean why the hell is it necessary to develop an idea which is a complete waste of paper. Over the course of a week I read few RSS feeds news and magazines and I love to read blogs, real people, and real opinions.

About 5 years ago I was sitting having a coffee in a car rental office in Larnaca, having a chat and having a general chit chat about nothing memorable and I remember picking up a copy of this “Greek Who’s Who”, I knew then that it was a first issue, but I knew then that this was going to be a first of many. Just in case you have not seen this book or magazine or whatever it is now, I will give you a brief description. This one consisted of little squares of information, a photo and some info about the person it highlighted, was in black and white and described people that did something for a community or the person who invented the Agia Napa we all now know. so it seemed ok, but you could see that it did not matter how many books were sold (if any were sold, but the office staff told me it was free) that the books were not printed to make money, the books were purely there to give some information we might want to know, but it was a carrier for advertisements, and this is why the book had already made money even before it was printed.

So my point is that although I have not heard much about them in the recent years, they have brought out another book / magazine which focuses on Greek Cypriots (apparently!!) around the world that are wealthy, now it seems ok but it makes you sick to the stomach, that we have now come to the point where people get all excited about other people’s wealth, instead of celebrating how Cypriots and Greeks have changed the world for the best we celebrate how they have made money.

Many Cypriots emigrated from Cyprus very poor and went to countries like America, Canada, England, South Africa and of course Australia, I like many others are very proud of these people, but these types of publications are only focussing on wealth and nothing more, which is very shallow in today’s world. This publication is at risk of creating a bunch of 2nd, 3rd and 4th generation Cypriots who’s only ambition is to be rich, and nothing more to society. Of course you need to know that this book is a directory of the Who’s Who, but really it is there for advertisers, but honestly are the advertisers getting that much out of a booklet that probably has a limited distribution in the countries it is sent out too.

If anyone had read this and disagrees with me please get in touch, I know that people must enjoy reading this but let me know why, is it really that great to pry into people’s wealth. Surely there is better things to read, and is this publication even here for us readers or is it just a portal for advertisers. Obviously there is some very wealthy people that descent from Cyprus and Greece, without a doubt. But they have obviously added people that have not even been born to Greek or Cypriot parents, some people have no Greek or Cypriot heritage but have moved to Cyprus because of relaxed tax laws. if this was a serious publication it would be people with Cypriot blood, otherwise how many Russians will be in the next publication.

During the Turkish Invasion of Cyprus in 1974, 1619 Greek Cypriots went missing, as a child I was always told that there was hope that some of these people were still alive and maybe trapped on the Turkish side, maybe a prison in Turkey, held against their own will. I think that Cypriots have been fooling themselves; I think it is time to face the truth, these soldiers and civilians who served our country are now dead, simple as! The families deserve justice and I can honestly only see one way to solving the missing person situation. I believe the way forward to an island that is at peace is one step at a time solving problems, this needs to be the first problem to be solved otherwise there will never be any trust between both parties.

Turkey really need to be forthcoming with information, I believe that they should not be allowed into the EU, not because of their Economy or Religion, makes no difference to us, the main reason should be because of their war crimes. They need to co operate because how could anyone take them seriously otherwise. I understand that the Cypriot army were not perfect but they were defending their country, and I know the Turkish Cypriots will probably be shouting now saying the Turkish army was protecting the Turkish population of Cyprus, but we all need to get past this stage, stop talking about the past and move forward to finding these bodies buried in mass graves either in Cyprus or Turkey.

Astonishing as it is, for some very strange reason there is no law to find out how a person was killed once they have been exhumed, apparently the organisation carrying out the difficult task of exhuming only have to do DNA tests and contact the family, after that the family are to either do private to find out how their relative died, however that can be very costly and timely. The reason for this is so the public will not be outraged when they find out that they were shot or set alight, I think it’s fairly obvious they didn’t die from influenza.
I think the best way forward before we can do anything else is to create an amnesty for those that have killed a Cypriot or a Turkish Cypriot, it could be done anonymously through local government, maybe we could do something where the person who did the killing could go and plant a small flag where they think the site is, I think then the local police could search the site, there is pros and cons with this way, obviously the murderers from both sides get away with the murder, but I am sure this is better than the family never knowing where there husband, wife, son or daughter has been buried and for once let their mind be at rest after having a burial.

We all need to be completely honest and wake up to the fact that they are dead, and we need to start finding out where they are, the Cypriot government needs to push harder, and the UN need to support this, Everyone has an opinion now but they were happy to sit back and watch in 1974.

What do you all think; would it be wrong to let people off with a murder? Should we leave the bodies buried and hidden and still no prosecution will happen, and we are no better off?

Well let’s face it; it couldn’t have been an accident. Imagine the grave robbers explaining this to the authorities.
But joking aside, it is a gruesome thing to do, I understand that as Cypriots we tend to hold on to grudges for a long time and to be fair this could also be a motive, but the truth is there are hundreds of motives, but in Cyprus like many small countries really dark nasty rumours start to make the rounds and this has to be because they Cypriot people are in shock, and they have no answers, their asking questions and the authorities cannot answer them, rumours are bound to circulate.

Up to this date, the police and government have asked for the assistance of Interpol, they hope that they will be able to point them in the right direction to finding the culprits. It seems the motives so far are:
* Cypriots trying to destabilise the peace process.
* Turkish Cypriots trying to destabilise the peace process.
* Holding the body for a ransom.
* Revenge plot where the people have no interest in money, where the motive is pure revenge.

The chances of  body being given back or found are quite slim, I am not saying they won’t ever get it back but if you look at some of the motives a above most of them are to prove a point, the only situation I could imagine where they would get the body back would be if it was being held for a ransom. The only people that actually know what is going on at the moment is the family and the police and government.

There is people out there that do certain crazy things in life, purely for the risk and the idea of proving a point, this is often a catastrophic course to take and the nature of this person or group is something to be very worried about, because chances are they will never give the body back, it will end up being thrown into a field or into a beach, these people feel like they have nothing to lose and nothing they do is risky enough to prove a point. these people live with us, eat with us and work with us.

The police need to send out a very strong and powerful message that this will not be tolerated.

The story is different in Cyprus, however the only similarity is that they are also in a recession, but will they get out of one of the world’s biggest recessions, I am not too sure it will be that easy. Cyprus has been a growing country since the 1980′s but up until the 2000′s the economy has been getting stronger and stronger, with lots of outside investment and excellent entrepreneurs making new business’s it seems nobody seen this recession coming.

But for the last 20 years as the Cypriot economy has been growing and quite stable it is a fair comment to suggest that the economy of Cyprus has and probably always will be based on tourism, on the last data I have it says that the most important industries in Cyprus are tourism, financial services and real estate. This makes a lot of sense, but the problem with those three sectors is that they all rely on each other to work and the biggest problem is if the main one (tourism) does not work then the whole system starts to fail.

In England the holiday market has been one sector where consumers have been still indulging in, even in the recession it seemed that the consumer was willing to change their shopping habits by changing supermarket to a cheaper discount store and eating at restaurants less but having more take away meals, suddenly the importance of their yearly or twice yearly holiday went up significantly, because they wanted to go somewhere hot, somewhere not too far away, and most of all cheap to get there, cheap to stay there and of course cheap to eat and drink there. Tourists that used to flock to Cyprus are now saying how expensive it is to visit in comparison to A: previous years and B: other countries.

I read how travellers now favour different destinations like Bulgaria, Turkey, North Cyprus (although they still fly into Larnaca or Paphos airport), they say that the price of getting to Cyprus and staying in Cyprus is just too expensive, surely it will not get any cheaper to visit in the future?

The government will need to invest into different economies to see if they could strengthen the position of Cyprus for future generations, imagine “made in Cyprus” instead of “made in Taiwan”.

We hope you enjoy our blog, you dont have to agree, infact we would prefer it if you was completely honest and comment about your feelings.

We will focus on news from Cyprus and news from England that affects cypriots in any shape or form.

Enjoy

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