633 Squadron Theme

The theme music from the movie of the same name 633 Squardron , released April 1964, music by Ron Goodwin.

Life in North Carolina - my new home

Here I am in my 4th month of living in my new home town of Grandy North Carolina , oh its been a huge change for me moving to a quiet little town with a population of approximately 2,000 people in the County of Currituck with a population of 24,000. its been somewhat of a huge change for me leaving my previous adopted town of Limassol that is having a population of 201.257 from an Island of a million people altogether and wow have I felt the change , some of the changes have been wonderful but I have to admit to some days of wanting to pack my bags and my precious loving husband and return to Cyprus.

Arriving here to USA in the middle of winter I guess wasn’t the best time of the year to be settling in , mostly due to the area being a bit of a tourist place , it was very very quiet , especially where our house is situated , its unfortunate that I haven’t been able to drive yet due to me having to re-sit the drivers test and have to be having the immigration papers all in order to do so ,I’m waiting for my permanent residence status being processed right now and hopefully that will be soon, then I’m sure I will start to explore the are a lot more, work and make friends.

I have met only a couple of the neighbours around here up until now, I have to say a big Thank you to my immediate neighbour Dorothy and her husband Colon who have been so very very kind to me since my arrival, she has taken me shopping many times , taken me for lunch and entertained me at her home more than once , thank God for Angels , she has been so wonderful to me, not only me but to my son who came here on a short visit during his spring break from Uni. he was over the moon to be taken to see the Wright Brothers first flight memorial ,especially as his goal in life is to be become a commercial pilot .

Dorothy ,Colon and my son John Michael.

I did get to visit a few very nice places that I intend to visit again when I do eventually get my drivers permit sorted, I got to experience a good old English Tea house in Elizabeth City where I enjoyed the most delicate Cucumber sandwiches !! and strawberry cream scones

mmm..I want one now

Apart from this kind of trip out and filling my stomach with goodies I have also enjoyed the by now many trips to Maple Park that Chester has been mentioning in his blog , and instead of my stomach being fed I took along lots of bread slices and some of my less than perfect Hot cross buns from Easter and fed them to the Geese and ducks that I have found there ( I am very fond of ducks ), well I hope I didn’t kill them off with the hot cross buns as when we went to the park last time the ducks were no where to be found ! Here is 2 of the cutest ducks I have ever came across , so comical and very tame in comparison to the geese who are quite nervous and dont come too close to us

Maple Park definately one of my favourite places to go and feel relaxed, Chester told me it was actually constructed on top of a garbage dump ,but they sure did make a good transformation of it and its a real pretty area where there are lots of benches to sit and quite a few pergolas with picnic tables and handy grills for folks like us that like to eat outdoors often , we had our first Easter there together and cooked our lamb kebabs there , shame it was a freezing cold wind blowing but all the same I loved it .

This week there was a few days of mild weather so I had taken a walk along the main road running through Grandy where there are a few shops , I noticed a small Thrift shop called Classic closet consignments and decided to take a look , the girl who runs it is called Becky and was very nice and soon started to chat to me , well it was interesting as she told me that she had another Brit friend who lived in Grandy and proceeded to call this friend up and introduce her to me , well to my surprise Lyn lives but at the bottom of out Street !! since then we have had a couple of coffees together and chatted , Lyn has lived here in US for over 34 years and told me she felt exactly the way I did when she arrived all those years back but reassured me that she soon got used to life here in North Carolina and now loves it , well I feel better already finding someone who I can have a chat and a coffee with on a regular basis I really do miss all my pals in Cyprus ,well I still chat with them on Skype or by e.mail but its not the same as a face to face , so I am sure Lyn and I will become good friends also.

Not only did I find a friend in Beckys shop but I found the cutest cruet set for the kitchen table , a pair of ducks !! brand new and costing not even a dollar so I snapped them up instantly ,here they are

Well thats enough for now on my life in North Carolina , I think I am gradually liking it more here, of course it doesn’t matter where I am as long as I am having my Mr G next to me life is perfect

Happy Easter Everyone

Chroniá Pollá! - Easter Wishes

This will be the first year since 1984 that I havent spent my Easter weekend in Cyprus and to be honest I think I am going to miss the Orthodox Easter celebrations and activities, I am of course just so happy to be with Chester here in North Carolina USA as we have always just wished us together anyway wherever we are and thats the main thing , but Easter is just a very special celebrated event there in Cyprus and there are some very nice events and foods to be enjoyed so for sure I am wishing us both back there to participate.

well let me tell those of you who are not familiar a little about ' Pasxa '( Easter ) as its called there in Cyprus ! :

The holiday is usually never falling the same time as the Western world as different calendars are used to determine the dates Greeks using the Julian calendar and the western world uses the Gregorian one ,anyhow in Cyprus this year it will fall on 17th 18th and 19th of April
Starting with the Good or Great Friday all government building fly the flags at half mast to mark the mournful day and each individual church around Cyprus starts early in the morning to make an Epitaphios of Christ, this involves decorating a kind of wooden frame with fresh flowers , its kind of a little competition I think to see who makes the best one and over the years I have seen some very attractive ones and its always a hard decision to say which is the best ,here is a photo of one I took the last year before I left Limassol.
This Epitaphios when done is kept in the church until evening when they hold the service and then carry it out into the streets in a procession to be viewed by all the people .

















Decorating the Epitaphios




Next is the Easter Saturday , apart form the families preparing the various easter specialities to eat , things like 'soureki ' ' and 'Flaunas' which are types of breads , eggs are coloured and after that the families are wanting to get their best clothes and get dressed ready to go to the churches to be there for 11pm they take along various styles of candles ( Lampada) ready to be lit at midnight when the bells toll to announce that Christ is risen , and the echos of the words 'Christos Anesti ' can be heard everywhere as everyone greets eaqch othere with the message , the response to this greeting is ' Alithinos Anesti ' which means the true lord is indeed risen. Fireworks are set off and huge bonfires are lit and the atmosphere is indeed joyful.

After the families get home , tradition calls for everyone to enjoy home made soup made usually only at easter ( Magiritsa ) its a kind of creamy ,lemony soup made from lamb sweetmeats ,and also some of the breads I have mentioned , and also the classic Ouzo or red wine is there to add to the enjoyment and contribute to the merriment !! usually this celebration is going on until early hours of the Sunday morning.

The big Sunday of course is again spent in rejoicing with family and friends and the grills and spits are turning all over the island barbecuing the Lamb/kid Souvla pieces which the Cypriots love to eat, along with a hundred other dishes and goodies , hotels on the Island have very reasonable offers for the local who want to travel to another part of the island to spend the weekend , I had the pleasure last year to stay at the Sunrise Beach Hotel ,my friend was visiting from UK so we headed of to the town of Protaras and had a wonderful time, she loved the traditional Greek dancers who entertained us with their show at the Sunday Lunch .





This year will be special just the same even though Chester will be working all of the weekend and instead of going to visit the Epitaphios at the church we are heading off to the Immigration offices in Norfolk to have my biometric finger prints taken to proceed with the process of me getting permanent resindency , not so exciting but a must all the same , maybe we will manage to still bring some of the traditions of Cyprus to the house here in Grandy and I can download some Greek music and Chester can don his white thermals and his huge homer simpson slimppers and dance a zorbas or something around the back yard whilst he cooks some American style burgers ...ha ha ha ha ha

Best wishes everyone for the coming weekend , and lets keep the real reason for Easter in our hearts and be thankful for Christs ultimate scrifice of his son who died on the cross but rose again,

Kalo Pascha from both of us .