6/11/08

I am sitting outside right now, on the front porch of our apartment, soaking up a perfect mid-day sun and posing as an unknown audience to some skilled classical pianist practicing at the music school upstairs. Our neighborhood is quiet, but active. Musicians come and go, construction workers hammer away next door, cars drive up to, well, anywhere the please and park haphazardly, half on the sidewalk and facing no particular direction.

I like this place. The clean lines of the buildings and absence of yards feel unusually home-y - maybe it is just the fact that everything looks very lived in and taken care of. There are, despite a decided lack of rainfall in the last five years, lots of trees and bushes and flowers surrounding these houses. They must have figured out a way to derive water from dust.

Water. Now there is an interesting subject. Water has been a problem for Cyprus lately. I guess no rain in five years will do that to you.... So, consequently, water is only run to households every other day. Our apartment is on the Tuesday/Thursday/Saturday schedule. Six girls, one shower, laundry, dishes- we haven't had a problem until last night.

From somewhere in the apartment, some yelled, "Uh, I think we just ran out of water!". We were all surprised, until we realized that the gap between Saturday and Tuesday is a day longer than what we had been used to. We should get more water tonight, but it hasn't come yet. Hopefully we won't be too deprived of our much needed showers, as the heat during the day here has been rising into the 100s. I'm also desperately in need of clean clothes- I'll never learn to wash some before I wear them all out.

It's really amazing to think of the heat that comes to this area of Cyprus over the summer. In August, the temperature soars into the 130s... but apparently not according to the news weather sources, who report a lower temperature just to keep people calm and from maxing out the energy used by air conditioners. Of course, everyone here knows that they are lying, so the only good the whole scheme achieves is in the backwards way it reminds residents to keep careful watch on their A/C usage. What a mind game! All this low humidity and clear skies is wonderful, but I'm starting to miss rain, I think...