Paphos People

A LATE MAY MORNING

It’s 5.45, on a late May morning at our house in Peyia. I make some hot drinks and take one upstairs to my wife. She slumbers on, then me and the dog ‘Tino’ head down to the poolside. We sit on the westerly facing patio, me with a cup of coffee and a biscuit for us both to share and watch as the sun rises from behind us gradually illuminating the surrounding hillside.
The first to light up is the red and white mobile phone antenna a necessary modern adornment to the hilltop. It enables people to wake up and check their devices to see what the weather is going to be like. Me, I prefer to look out of the window.
One by one the line of houses on the road to Kathikas and the skeleton of somebody’s long abandoned dream home perched precariously on the side of the hill are bathed in watery sunlight.
Cackling Magpies sit on the fence and taunt ‘Tino’ until he makes a run towards them, rising up into the air laughing as they go they leave him powerless on the floor.
Two manic dogs bark as the man who lives a couple of hundred metres away lets them out in the garden. He comes out for his first cigarette and a mug of tea before getting his kids ready for school. That’s how his day begins, and for his immediate neighbours as well no doubt!

The swifts arrive, just one at first swooping down to the pool and scooping a beak full of water banking sharply to avoid the house, he rises high into the blue sky quickly followed by a squadron of rapidly diving birds each one skilfully avoiding each other and obstacles. One flies into the house and collides with the window falling to the floor. Fearing the worst I pick it up, amazingly soft and light. I carry it over to the wall. After a couple of cheeps it takes off and re-joins the aerobatic display. Swifts never land voluntarily so I consider myself privileged to have handled one. Another month or so they will be away to North Africa until next spring.
The pigeons who have set up a community in one of the unfinished houses, of which there are many, stop their cooing and fly overhead looking for food.

As the sun moves onto the fence the geckos start to appear soaking up the Sun’s rays to jump start their metabolism. They hang from the top rail looking like the raincoats in the cloakroom in my junior school on a wet wintery morning in the UK. These are only the puny little ones. The big muscle boys start to gather on the top of the garden wall, posing, with their heads held high as if they are in a Mr. Universe competition.

It’s time for the both of us to take a morning walk, peaceful and pleasant. He decides to go up the hill today. He sits at the side of the road waiting for my instruction. We cross then he trots on, tail high in the air, sniffing every small plant or bush. Ablutions completed we turn for home, a kilometer twice a day keep both of us mobile.

The smell of coffee and toast is in the air as we come through the door. My wife is up. She asks what we have been doing. I look at the dog he looks at me “Nothing really just observing” I reply.