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Greetings from Antalya airport, in Southern Turkey, on the Mediterranean.

I’ve just spent a week in this part of the world, and to be honest, there wasn’t much of a reason for coming here in Antalya initially; my friend has a place by a sea, invited me along, I declined. Then I thought about work and how I could hop across the water to nearby Northern Cyprus (the Turkish part) where some potential clients awaited. Consulted my boss, and bingo, an unexpected week in Turkey and Cyprus. The strange thing is that I’d always wanted to go to Turkey but I never ever thought I’d break the duck in Antalya - a beautiully bland port city which will either be the next big thing for British tourists, or if last week’s election results are anything to go by, then it could well be 20 years’ time before they see a boom here.

Still, shouldn’t moan about a week in the sun when I know so many of you (especially you teachers with six weeks’ leave) are gagging to go somewhere, or anywhere just to avoid the rain. In order for you all not to hate me, I did experience the downpour and hailstorms a few weeks back in London - I just happened to have missed the really, really nasty stuff. No rain here though, of course, just an excrusiating heatwave which makes having a shower a complete waste of water.

But people here are friendly - and very attractive too - hospitable, outgoing, and constantly mistaking me for a Japanese tourist despite my ever-darker skin colour thanks to the sun. However, I have struggled on two fronts: as a non-lamb eater, it’s beef, chicken or fish, and language barriers mean sometimes it’s easier just to walk out than to ask whether it’s lamb or beef. I tried vegetaraianism for a day which doesn’t work in Turkey. The other thing which I’ve had to revisit/confront for the first time in my adulthood are the twin-evils of cockroaches and geckoes - two creatures which tormented me when I was a child in Hong Kong - much like the fear of spiders with a lot of people. Put it this way, I probably need to seek therapy to get over my phobia for geckoes (lizard-like creatures which climb on walls and doors, and jump on you when they hide behind a toilet roll) that I struggled to even approach my hotel door the other night in Girne, Northern Cyprus because the gecko was lurking (and not moving) near the door handle. I tried in vain to get close to the door, shut my eyes and be done with the unlocking. But I tried that twelve times, never having the courage to go through with the process. I still haven’t worked out how I managed the ‘breakthrough’ in the end - some 25 minutes later - though I’m sure tiredness and sheer desperation played their parts.

That was about as exciting as Girne in the Turkish Republic of Northen Cyprus got - beautiful place, nice people blah blah blah but extremely boring. Nicosia - the last divided capital city in the world between the Turks in the North and Greek Cypriots in the south - was equally charmless. It was fun getting lost in the northern half before walking through the UN buffer zone to get to the south, only for the south to be equally shit. But it was fascinating to see bombed out buidlings from thirty years ago still in evident on the UN Green Line. Still, at least I can now strike Cyprus off the list and can boast eight vias checks just for going between Tukey and Cyprus in two days. Yes, eight - four at ferry ports and four at the UN buffer zone. Paranoia and distrust are still the reasons why Cyprus is divided into two.

(Above - the divided city of Nicosia)

I think I’m going to Malta the week after for work and I still haven’t booked it yet. Still, if you fancy a free holiday, get in touch: you only have to pay for the flights and I need distractions from those boring boring beaches.

I’m writing this from Dome Hotel’s lobby at almost 1am, having fled the gecko-infested resort in Catalkoy and back to more friendly (and more expensive) surroundings of downtown Girne, which continues to be bland and beautiful (above)
Last night was quite hellish for me - well, it amounts to nothing for most people, but naturally a great big deal for me. The reason - a gecko on my hotel door. I was so sared of it that I just couldn’t bring myself to opn the door. It required 15 or so failed attempts just to approach the door, and over 25 minutes of standing around, waiting for the gecko to move away. Naturally, it lingered around and moved just a few inches throughout my ordeal. I don’t exactly what made me go up and open the door after almost half-an-hour of waiting - I guess closing my eyes helped, as did leaving the lights off in the room, from brushing my teeth to taking a shower…yes, I went to such extreme lengths in order not to see a second or third gecko in my room. Just the sort of thing that I did when I was a kid. Can’t believe it’s still happening to me twenty years later.

I’ve spent the whole of today meeting clients, clients who hated each other, and when I finally got out of them at 5.15pm, I dashed to the hotel, checked-in, and ran for those little domuses to get to Nicosia before it got dark, and I have to say, it was well worth the effort and taxi money to get there. The city itself is not terribly exciting, but it was fun to get lost in the Northern Turkish side as I tried to find the crossing to the Cypriot side. It took me ages as I lost my bearings in a town where nothing was over two storeys high. Although it took almost two hours to find this single crossing-point and the UN buffer zone, it was vry exciting to see ‘no photography’ signs and Turkish gun-totting soldiers guarding the border, whilst getting my stamp on a piece of paper. All very exciting stuff.

Sadly, the city itself is a complete let-down. Nothing to do, nothing to see, and little else to excite me. Great food though but sometimes great/cheap food is not enough to save a place, and I’m afraid Lefkosa or Nicosia has slipped to the very bottom of places that I least like. Sorry Cyprus.

(This decision has nothing to do with the geckp-cockroaches incident, of course).

(main shopping district in Nicosia - with the obligatory pan-pipers)

Kyrenia, or Girne, or whatever - nice enough place but dreadfully boring - are all coastal towns on the Eastern Mediterranean like this? A little old town, a castle, a bit of the new town and that’s it?!

I’m here for work but I might as well just go back to Turkey as soon as I can for not only do I feel bored, but both childhood nemesis of cockroaches AND geckoes are torturing me in great numbers here. Ok, the geckoes here are ‘cute’ compared to the ones in South East Asia. However, they still move too quickly to my liking and the fact that they have a habit of scaring the shit out of me at night means I will not be able to walk properly (without looking round for potential ‘dangers’) until I’m back in London next week. And then there’s Malta - how can I cope for a whole week with these two disgusting creatures in close proximity to me?

The ferry across today from the Turkish port of Alanya was surprisingly pleasant. I got my passport stamp into Northern Cyprus on a separate piece of paper, which should allow me to pop into Cyprus ‘proper’ tomorrow afternoon which I’m looking forward to greatly. Before that, I have to meet a couple of clients - iI’m actually staying at a resort owned by one of them (where the forementioned creatures are continuously tormenting me) whilst I’m meeting the other day at a supermarket!

I’m actually fairly hopeful of one of the deals despite my deep and unplesant misgivings about this place in general, which means this trip will have been more than worthwhile in the long-run. From what I’ve seen, Girne is a beautiful little port, if a little bland. But its people are very hospitable - as they all were in Antalya - and it’s also interesting to note that they drive on the same side at the Brits and have sockets that are also only found in the UK. Looks like the colonial legacy is here to stay - some 50 years after the withdrawl of British sovereignty over the tiny nation in the Eastern end of the Mediterranean.

The weird and wonderful world of hotel lobby music -

This morning - My Heart Will Go On - with panpipes

and

right now - Turkey’s Eurovision winner from 2003 - the instrumental version.

So, I’m not sick of cannabis - why would I as I don’t smoke the stuff? - I mean politicians confessing to smoking dope or skunk or whatever when they were younger. I don’t quite undersatnd why these kinds of things are newsworthy, nor do I feel they are embarrassing for the people concerned, no matter where they are in government. As long as they are not current users of the drug, then it’s not a matter for the public to know about.

Seeing the new Home Secretary Jacqui Smith (and her plunging neckline) on TV yesterday, apologising for her past misdemeanour was cringeworthy and wholly unnecessary. She said it was an embarrassment - it is in a sense that she had to do it this way. Why should anyone apologise for such trivial matters from over 25 years ago? Smoking cannabis is not exactly murder or genocide and doesn’t warrant a public apology in any way. Much like extramarital affairs or inky sexual habits, what politicans get up to in thir private lives is a personal matter, and as long as they do no interfere with their work, or are not hypocritical to their policies, it has nothing to do with us.

Jacqui Smith has far more important things to deal with right nowthan to go on national television first thing in the morning to talk about this non-sense, and she, and Harriet Harmen should now be left alone to gt on with their jobs.

By the way - that rules me out of any any jobs in governments or high-profile organisations then.

The heat is pretty intense out there, so I’m seeking refuge in my hotel mezzanine. Despite the 40 degrees or so, however, it is bearable given the air is dry, rather than humid. And strolling around late last night along the coast was a most refreshing experience, with the onshore breeze and the gentle nature of its folk, sitting/loitering/chatting/smoking/eating on benches and parks even at around midnight. Another thing I’ve noticed is how many shops were still opened that late at night, which is a rarity in Europe. I don’t just mean food stalls, but also clothes stores and street vendors. It’s so relaxing here that there is none of the hustle and bustle that I’m used to in London.

Another thing which struck me is how many stray cats there are in the city centre. As someone who loathes them with a passion, a few of them have alreday given me a bit of a fright by lunging out of the many bushes on the sidestreets. I guess I’d been in that kind of reactionary-jump-when-you-see-a-rat mode as soon as I arrived yesterday. This reaction stems from my childhood in Hong Kong when I would jump-scream-sprint as soon as I saw a rat, cockroach or a gecko. And because I’m in the Med, I half-expeted to see these things lurking around on the pavement to scare the shit out of me. Yes, I saw a cockroach - my first since Hong Kong four years ago - but I didn’t expect to be frghtened by these cats, who are all very thin, by the way. And they’re everywhere - much like Amsterdam, by the way. There people let their cats catch rats in restaurants which result in customers rubbing shoulders with these feline creatures on a daily basis. I don’t know what the rat popultion is here, or whether cats are deployed in that way, but for now, I don’t like them.

Well, hadn’t realised that I haven’t updated this blog for over a week - been too busy to remember that I have this thing. Anyhow, I am off on my travels again tomorrow - this time to Atalya in Turkey tomorrow. Now that I have a laptop - I guess I have no excuse but to be write more often on this blog from now on.

It was supposed to be the greatest weekend of sport ever.Ok, it hasn’t quite begun yet but already, one of the main pratagonists in making the weekend of the 7th July a sporting feast failed to read the script and got knocked out of Wimbledon.

Justin Henin, the world number one and a heavy favourite for the women’s title at SW19, was sensationally knocked out by the little-known Frenchwoman Marion Bartoli in today’s semi-final, thus depriving the Belgian a chance to win the one Grand Slam title to have eluded her.

That leaves Roger Federer to carry all the expectations before him and possibly claim a history-equalling fifth consecutive men’s title on Sunday - assuming he gets past Richard Gasquet, and then either Novak Djokovic or Rafael Nadal.

Away from tennis, the Tour de France starts in London for the first time in its 104-year history, with the Prologue starting in The Mall.

Lewis Hamilton goes for gold at the British Grand Prix at Silverstone, whilst Authorized bids to be become the first Derby winner to win the Eclipse at Sandown in nearly 20 years.

Lots of firsts, lots of statistics, and lots of history-making potential.

Shame that Henin won’t be part of the fun. Here’s to Venus Williams for a fourth Wimbledon title, and a place in Wimbledon history as the lowest seeded women’s player to lift the famour Venus Whitewater dish!