Cyprus-Forum.com

[DrCyprus]

As a Greek Cypriot I was brought up speaking a powerful, poetic, rhythmic language, a direct descendant of Byzantine Koine Greek. Vasilis Michaelides masterfully used this beautiful language to write poems and epics that touch the heart and the mind of every Greek Cypriot in a deep mystical way.

All the same, at school I was told that I was just speaking a 'dialect', a 'village' way of speaking. All Greek Cypriot comedies came together under the idea that everything Cypriots traditionally did was the 'village' way, χωρκάτικον είναι. There was another, more official, more Greek version of what I spoke. A standard modern Greek that was spoken in 'mother' Greece.

During class times, when I raised my hand, I always chose to answer with the dialect. Some teachers didn't even aknowledge my answer and turned to other students who would say it 'properly'. Girls in the back would giggle at my 'horkatika'.

I'm here to tell you that being Greek, and being proud to be Greek and being a descendant of Greek culture has nothing to do with ceding our identity, our language and our island and sovereignity to Greece. As a Greek people we can speak OUR Greek language and have OUR Greek culture. We do not need any other country to hold our hands and mother us.

Perhaps education in Cyprus has changed now, and perhaps I'm out of loop in how educators treat the Greek Cypriot language now. All the same, it's time that we took our language in our own hands. We need to be able to express what we speak in a written way that doesn't involve English or foreign dipthongs. We need to make our own Greek Cypriot National Anthem and stop living our Greekness by proxy of another entity.

At the end of the day, Cypriot Greek and mainland Greek both started as dialects of Byzantine Koine Greek just as Galician and Castillian both started as dialects of Latin. Even though the whole of Spain speaks Castilian, the inhabitants of Galicia also speak Galician which is internationally recognised as a language.

[GreekIslandGirl]

Isn't it time you stopped looking for divisions where they don't exist?

- Cyprus has far more important things to worry about than how you remember your school days.

[Get Real!]

The problem with your theory is that the world does not and will never understand your muddled, bastardized identity and if you cannot simplify it then you are doomed.

Had someone claimed to be a Gujarati Pakistani who speaks “koine Sri Lankan” thanks to his Bangladeshi descendants, he’d have as much respect from you as you have for gypsies!

So quit clouding and bastardizing yourselves with multiple complex labels or you’re as good as GONE from history and your enemies will defeat you that much easier.

If you continue down this destructive path the Ottoman remnants will start convincing the world that *they* are the only “Cypriots” (as outrageous as this may sound) simply because they will have won the world over with label simplicity and clarity!

[Get Real!]

The average Cypriot constantly FAILS to understand that the world hasn’t got the time or the interest to go over some complex story about some ancient “Greek” arrivals thousands of years ago and how you are somehow related to all that so quit SHOOTING yourselves in the foot!

[DrCyprus]

Isn't it time you stopped looking for divisions where they don't exist?

- Cyprus has far more important things to worry about than how you remember your school days.

Thank you for expressing the very mentality that defiles the Greeks of Cyprus and puts us further and further away from a solution to the Cyprus problem.

I'm not here to look for 'divisions', but to express myself and share my thoughts and opinions on Greek Cypriot culture. How I remember my school days is essential to this as education is the very bread and butter of a culture.

How dare you preach me on what is important or unimportant you indoctrinated twit, and who made you an authority on this matter anyways?

The core of the problem in Cyprus is one of identity. I'm one of the many voices of Cyprus, and I shall raise my voice with might. You are just an old Scottish lady.

[DrCyprus]

The average Cypriot constantly FAILS to understand that the world hasn’t got the time or the interest to go over some complex story about some ancient “Greek” arrivals thousands of years ago and how you are somehow related to all that so quit SHOOTING yourselves in the foot!

My post didn't touch any Mycenaean history but rather alluded to our Eastern Grecoroman language and culture whilst I was speaking on our language.

[GreekIslandGirl]

Most of us don't have a problem with our identity. Stop wrecking Cyprus with your own insecurities because as GR! says, you will have the Turks, who never question theirs, soon obliterate ours!

Who cares what dialect of Greek you speak? There are as many dialects as there are towns!

[Get Real!]

The average Cypriot constantly FAILS to understand that the world hasn’t got the time or the interest to go over some complex story about some ancient “Greek” arrivals thousands of years ago and how you are somehow related to all that so quit SHOOTING yourselves in the foot!

My post didn't touch any Mycenaean history but rather alluded to our Eastern Grecoroman language and culture whilst I was speaking on our language.

Your story TAXED my brain and if I were a judge in a court of law about to decide on who owns the rock, I’d hand it over to the person who came up with the short and sweet story like…"Hey, I saw the confused and abandoned rock in 1571 and grabbed it" instead of someone lost in some ancient trance of mythology!

[Get Real!]

Simplify yourselves Cypriots!

Name your language as simply “Cypriot”, name your history Cypriot, and name your descendants Cypriot!

Point to the ancient ruins of Cyprus and tell the whole world that THEY are your ancestors and stop looking in other countries and places to find your origins for they are right here staring at you in the face!

The only way for foreigners to understand and accept the story painted by the likes of Sotos or Piratis is to be very high on barbiturates for they would need a strong dose of drugs to enter that ancient mythical trance that they want them to accept as the origin of the Cypriot!

[Get Real!]

The Greek history books that they were teaching us with pre-74 were provided FREE OF CHARGE by Greece by that “ODEB” (Greek government distribution and publication propaganda machine) to facilitate DOUBLE ENOSIS.

Who in the right mind would accept free history books by another country unless a treasonous conspiracy was involved?

And then some of you wonder why I hate Greece…