Moving to North Cyprus

Isn’t it funny how quickly we can forget unpleasant things and sign up to them all over again?  Last week the buyers of our property in Ozankoy took over the house and were happy to do so…but then they asked if I’d use my wealth of vastly superior knowledge in terms of all things ‘moving to North Cyprus’ (hmmmm) and help them with the process of importing their furniture.

Now, Andy and I performed this feat for ourselves about two years ago – and as I said, it’s funny how quickly you can forget really unpleasant things such as the horrendously long drawn out process that you have to go through to get your container out of jail in Famagusta and to your door – so of course I said, ‘yes I’ll help’…

By the way - any of you superior types out there reading this and thinking, ‘that doesn’t apply to me, I paid for a door to door service’ will have a very rude awakening!  Door to door removal service to North Cyprus doesn’t actually include a large bit in the middle where you have to jump though hoops to free your furniture from the Famagusta jail!

Firstly you have to have lists of irrelevant things translated into Turkish – usually your shipping agent knows someone who can do this for you for a small fee.  Then you have to go to the post office and buy 400 stamps – well, about 30 anyway, don’t believe anyone who says it’s only five or eight or something because you will come unstuck and find yourself two stamps away from ever seeing your beloved standard lamp again.  Then you have to go and find your local Muhktar in whichever coffee shop he happens to be frequenting – which will depend a lot on the day of the week, the time of the year and the heat of the day…and that’s all the easy bits out of the way.

Quite possibly the hardest part is finding the main police station in Nicosia to get your in and out certificate.  You might think there’d be a signpost, or maybe a map, or perhaps the shipping agents, runners or helpful expats you meet about the place would be able to describe to you how to get there.  You might think the police station would be somewhere obvious – like in the middle of Nicosia, or close to a landmark such as the big stadium or even just on a main road.  But you know, it’s not – and NO ONE can tell you where it is.

My best bet was calling Clint who’s the last person I know who imported all his worldly goods into North Cyprus…naturally enough I haven’t a clue where it is and the whole day it took me to find it last time (on foot in the midday sun in July) has been erased from my tiny mind…pretty much.  So I’m on the phone to Clint and his mum and I’m getting directions, I’m hearing things about the Wow dress shop, a little coffee shop, a field, a garage and a left hand turn that’s really a filter lane, a school, graffiti and a wall but I’m still not finding what I’m looking for. 

Neil is driving round in his rented fiesta like a man possessed, Gwen is desperately writing down everywhere we’re going in case she ever has to remember it again and then all of a sudden when we’re in the middle of some run down area with not a police station in sight we spot a police car – ‘follow that car’ I cry and off we set at about 90 miles an hour in hot pursuit of a policeman who could, for all we know, be on a shout!

Luckily Neil’s a retired policeman and so I figure if we get done for imitating a police car we’ll be fine and there’ll be an instant affinity between fellow officers of the law – or some such nonsense…anyway, the police car suddenly veers to the side of the road coming screechingly to a halt – so mad woman that I am I leap out and rush over to ask the policeman if he can tell me the way to the main police station – possibly not a wise move, I mean, he could be armed and dangerous and think I’m stalking him and shoot first and ask questions later.  But luckily for me he’s on the phone to a friend and doesn’t mind me hanging about looking furtive whilst waiting for him to finish his chat.  Now, he says he’ll give me directions, thinks about it for a while and then says – no – it’s too complicated to explain, follow me instead.

See – not even a policeman can describe how you get there.  So, off we go again at 90 miles an hour, round a roundabout, along a duel carriageway, in and out of cars, round bends, climbing every mountain, following every stream praying that he doesn’t pull us over for attempting to drive as fast and as dangerously as he does and then there we are….at the police station.  God only knows how we made it.  He points, waves and tears off back the way we came and we’re sitting there bewildered and wondering how we’ll ever find our way home – but you know what…it’s easy!  The police station is actually very easy to find – if you know where to look. 

So in order to be able to find our way again should we ever need to we went slowly back the way we came noting landmarks and the like and found ourselves right back on the road past the big stadium.

So – you want to know how to find the police station?

Right, come over the mountain from Girne, when you get to the big roundabout in Nicosia (which currently has fountains from the Flintstones in situ on all four corners (do roundabouts have corners?)) take the first left past the stadium, carry on past the turnings to Nalken clothes shop and customs (Gumruk) until you see an Alpet petrol station on your left by a set of traffic lights.  Get into the right hand lane at the lights and turn right.  Go along the road – past the Wow dress shop which is on your right, past a sort of open field bit on your left and take the SECOND left hand sort of filter lane/turn after the church and you’ll go down an incongruously narrow and unassuming road and there you’ll find the police station on your right!  Ha – so simple see!  Though chances are all the landmarks I mention will have moved by the time you come to do it and you’ll be forced to hijack a passing policeman too and by the time you get there it’ll be too late, they’ll have all gone for lunch and the Customs office will also be shut and so you’ll have to come back the next day – like we all did…