Cyprus-Forum.com

[purdey]

How many posters were around when it became nasty in Cyprus.Not the 74 invasion but the ten years proceeding.Or is your knowledge based on books,the media or hearsay ?

Or do you make it up as you go along ?

[purdey]

35 views and no takers.Should I wait for the big hitters to come on later tonight,or is this Cyprus-Forum for spotty adolecents.

[shahmaran]

I believe most people here were either not even born or just kids at the time and can tell you plenty of delusional stories like Phoenix, you might find one or two who were around and if you are lucky they might have not developed Alzheimers just yet, but then they are very likely to distort everything they know according to the side they are from.

Then we also have the ones who "claim" to be from one side yet interestingly, support the other side while disguising it as "unification".

Its quite a mix here i tell you

[purdey]

Yes I see your point.I was a kid at the time but do remember what I saw and heard.I still talk to the people who went through the troubles,who funnily enough apportion no blame to either side,and often think and wonder what happened to their neighbours.
Like my father they can identify that there was wrong doing but cannot understand where the dislike erupted from and the unpleasantness that followed.

[paliometoxo]

my perants where alive around as early as the 50's... but they dont really know how to turn on a pc let alone join this forum but they never talk about the war and how it was before the turks invaded my dad gets mad even when a turkish song on the radio is on .. doesent like to talk about them at all infact when it old him i went to north for a visit he told me stay away gets very mad on the subject... dont blame him my grandperants talk about it saying how my perants where during the war its nice to hear the stories but everyone has their own story very different from the last guy who was alive during war

[phoenix]

I've only just seen this thread, sorry I'm still just hopping on and off the forum until I can settle down properly again.

I was in Cyprus until 1965.

We had turbulent times. I was born in a stable in September 1958 because my mum could not get to a hospital as the British were bombing us. She had a TC midwife

Then we were bombed by the Turks in 1963 and 1964. I have a lot of gaps filled in by cousins now, and I will impart some more stories soon. But do not be fooled by the supposed innocence of the TCs and Turks until then.

Suffice it to say, that the bloody Turks where trying to divide the Island by foul means since at least 1963, only to succeed in 1974.

[Kikapu]

How many posters were around when it became nasty in Cyprus.Not the 74 invasion but the ten years proceeding.Or is your knowledge based on books,the media or hearsay ?

Or do you make it up as you go along ?

Purdey,

May I suggest you tell us everything that you have experienced during those times from '63 to '74, so that we can all get the feel of what you went through, rather than just telling us that you know all the nasty things that happened during those times. Some of us have written our experiences, so please, do the same. You do not need to write it all in one go. Just start in 1963 and finish in 1974 and take however much time you need to write it. Give it to us one page at a time if you like...thanks.

Happy writings.

[Piratis]

How many posters were around when it became nasty in Cyprus.Not the 74 invasion but the ten years proceeding.

It has been nasty for centuries in Cyprus. I don't thing any posters have been around that long.

Also being around doesn't make you necessarily more objective. E.g. you could be a British colonialist and keeping Cyprus enslaved and exploiting its people could be something very nice for you, while for the Cypriots it was obviously nasty.

[purdey]

It has also been nasty in the rest of Europe for centuries but that would be a different history lesson.Maybe let me say a few words and then judge me.Not all British were colonialists,some ended up in Cyprus looking for a new start while fleeing persecution from elsewhere.
There are many nationalities who regard themselves as Cypriot but who have arrived from Syria,Turkey,Israel,Jordan to name a few.
There is a huge mix of blood in Cyprus,not many will admit to be of mixed race but they are there and have been for generations.
The village where I have a house was a mixed village,and a nearby village was what SOME Greek Cypriots call a Turkish Cypriot village.Odd because the people who lived in this village called themselves Cypriot,maybe because they and their families had lived there for as long as they could remember and were Christian.
I came to Cyprus as a boy,although my family had roots in Cyprus long before.My father was in the RAF not through choice but because of National Service.He spoke Greek and had lived on the island many years before.We lived in Limassol in what, is regarded the Turkish Cypriot area not because it was a Turkish only area but because there were Turkish Cypriot families living among Greek Cypriots.We owned a house old with history and had neighbours of mixed race.We all spoke Greek as did our neighbours and life was unproblamatic.I played with all of the children and nobody was left out because of race or beliefs,in fact I did not know of any difference in race.

Being around as you say does not make me more objective,but it does offer a different opinion.I listen to differing stories all the time,the old tend to tell it how it was,when friends turned against friends,and others just did not want any part of it, and how they miss the old times.The young have differing views,some have none as they cannot be bothered or because it is now barely touched on in school.
The Greeks,well some are sympathetic but the majority do not care and never have done.Turkish Cypriots are very similar with the views of Greek Cypriots,but the older always regard themselves as Cypriots first and foremost,not Turkish.

[Piratis]

purdey, everybody is of "mixed race" apart from some lost tribes in the Amazon. In the UK for example this mix is greater. Cyprus is a mix of people belonging more or less to the same Mediterranean race. On the other hand the UK is not just a mix of German, Latin and other European people but also Africans, Asians etc.

About the divide between Greek and Turkish Cypriots this was something that was fueled by the British. Before the British came, the "Turkish Cypriots" where just Muslim Cypriots, many of them spoke Greek, some of them even had Greek as their first language. However the British created a "Turkish Cypriot community" out of these people so they count counter the struggle of Cypriots for liberation, and keep in this way huge areas of our island under colonial rule.