November 18, 2003

Have you Ever Been Deported?
Famagusta, North Cyprus

Tom and Ellie arrived at our hotel around noon. It was an excellent reunion as Mark and Tom hadn't seen each other in over 2 years. We headed south over the Kyrenia mountains without a care in the world -- looking forward to spending a few days catching up with our friends.

The drive provided a new insight into Cyprus - and it's status as the "driest" island in the Mediterranean. Away from the beautiful seashore is a dry rocky desert reminiscent of the high desert you travel through on the drive from Los Angeles to Las Vegas. (Coincidentally, the drivers here are almost as bad as they are on that California road...)

Anyhow, we arrived in Famagusta where Tom took us on a tour of the waterfront area. Apparently, this part of the island was shelled quite extensively during the fighting (war?) that resulted in the eventual split of the Island into the North and the Republic. The proof is in the "Beruit Architecture" -- old hotels that were bombed out have been standing empty for the last 20 years. Looking at it, you could easily be led to believe that you were in Iraq or a Middle East war zone.

Then we headed for the green line and the border. The first checkpoint was fine. At the second we got out and we were approved to exit the North, but at the 3rd border things started going wrong. Although we were allowed out of Turkish Cyprus, we were denied entry into the Republic because our port of entry was "unrecognized" and considered illegal. (We had researched this, and thought we were going to be okay -- but given that the border between the Republic and Cyprus has only been open since May -- there are a few things that aren't exactly published....) Ironically, while we were stuck on the green line, we were only 4 miles from Tom's house!

Fortunately, the North took us back. The border guard asked us, "What happened?"  and gave us the clue that we shouldn't have shown our original entry visa to the guards. With retrospect, we see that the exit stamp that we were given actually looks like a day trip pass.

We could have tried again, but decided against it. We had a good few hours with Tom and Ellie. Sure wish we could have seen baby Joe and Ollie... but there is always next time! We also had the opportunity to tour around Famagusta, which is a really nice, authentic Turkish Cypriot town. From here we'll head back to Girne and then across the mainland of Turkey and up to the Capadoccia region.

Previous Entry: November 15, 2003

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This Page was last update: Sunday, December 28, 2003 at 4:15:44 PM
This page was originally posted: 11/17/2003; 9:15:40 AM.
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