Sunday, August 2, 2026
1b320ebb-d68c-4239-94e8-651bab78005f
| Summary | ⛅️ Clear throughout the day. |
|---|---|
| Temperature Range | 23°C to 32°C (73°F to 89°F) |
| Feels Like | Low: 74°F | High: 99°F |
| Humidity | 59% |
| Wind | 12 km/h (7 mph), Direction: 257° |
| Precipitation | Probability: 0%, Type: No precipitation expected |
| Sunrise / Sunset | 🌅 05:58 AM / 🌇 07:49 PM |
| Moon Phase | Waning Gibbous (63%) |
| Cloud Cover | 5% |
| Pressure | 1008.65 hPa |
| Dew Point | 65.54°F |
| Visibility | 6.17 miles |
Conservation works at Ayios Irakleidios monastery in the Nicosia district are expected to be completed before the end of the year, Deputy Culture Minister Lina Kassianidou said on Saturday.
During a visit to the monastery, Kassianidou said the €2 million restoration project was progressing at a rapid pace.
She said the works are intended to improve the visitor experience while enhancing the monastery’s functionality.
The monastery, which dates back to the 18th century, is home to a community of nuns. It is named after Saint Irakleidios, who came from the Galatia region in what is now Turkey. He was converted to Christianity by the Apostles Paul, Barnabas and Mark upon their arrival in Cyprus and later became Bishop of Tamasos.
The conservation project is being carried out in cooperation with the Department of Antiquities.
More than 3,800 students have participated in environmental education programmes at the Salamiou Environmental Education Centre this year.
The centre promotes environmental awareness through field trips, ecosystem observations and hands-on activities designed to connect students with the area’s natural environment, history and local community.
“The Salamiou area offers excellent opportunities for studying ecology, geology and botany. It is located between the Diarizos and Xeropotamos valleys, has rich biodiversity, significant flora and fauna, and serves as a passage for migratory birds as well as protected species, such as the griffon vulture,” said Maria Georgiou, a teacher on the centre’s pedagogical team.
Around 50 students and their teachers visit the centre each day. Participants range from kindergarten to secondary school pupils, with the centre offering 34 educational programmes tailored to different age groups.
The programmes cover subjects including water, soil, biodiversity, ecosystems, energy, climate change and sustainability, with activities adapted to the age and educational level of participants.
The centre also places particular emphasis on connecting students with the local community through its history, traditional architecture and local products.
“Children don’t just learn from books. They go out into the field, take measurements in the river, observe ecosystems, identify plants and animals, participate in birdwatching and insect observation, and even take part in exploration games and treasure hunts. Our aim is to turn knowledge into experience,” Georgiou said.
Teacher Maria Neophytou also stressed the importance of children’s direct interaction with nature.
“Students need to go out into nature, study it and experience it. At first, many are hesitant, but when they find themselves in the natural environment, they change completely. They develop respect for nature, collaborate, discover and learn through experience,” she said.
Neophytou added that the centre is an integral part of the local community rather than operating separately from it.
“They learn not only about nature but also about the history, traditions and culture of the region. Environmental education is directly linked to local society and sustainable development,” she said.
Police have launched an investigation into the brain death of a four-year-old boy while he was being transferred to Makarios hospital in Nicosia on July 14.
“A police investigation is underway into this incident, during which statements have already been taken from, among others, the personnel involved,” the state health services (Okypy) said.
Okypy said its own internal investigation, launched earlier into the case, would continue in accordance with the organisation’s procedures and regulations.
“It is important to preserve the fundamental principles of the rule of law, including the presumption of innocence, until the completion of the relevant procedures,” Okypy said, adding that it would fully cooperate with the authorities and provide all necessary assistance during the investigation.
The internal investigation was launched after the boy’s mother publicly alleged that her son’s brain death resulted from the handling of his case by his paediatrician and staff at Limassol general hospital.
According to the mother’s account, the boy developed a fever on July 8 and remained under his parents’ care while they stayed in contact with his paediatrician, who prescribed medication and ordered tests over the following days.
When his condition failed to improve, he was taken to Limassol general hospital, where he was diagnosed with meningitis.
As his condition deteriorated further, his parents requested that he be transferred to Makarios hospital in Nicosia.
According to the complaint, the boy suffered brain death while being transported to the hospital on July 14.
The Civil Defence remains on full alert due to the prevailing high temperatures, carrying out preventive patrols across the island, spokesperson Panayiotis Liasidis said on Saturday.
Liasidis said that patrols are being carried out with four vehicles for immediate intervention if deemed necessary and that the force is maintaining constant communication with the relevant services to ensure readiness.
He added that the fire brigade was also patrolling daily and deploying drones as part of the effort.
As visitors approached the final installation of A Slight Indisposition, the controversial exhibition which drew to a close on Sunday at the Nicosia Municipal Arts Centre (Nimac), what comes into view is the large trunk of a mulberry tree embedded with copper coins covered in verdigris.
From afar, the work by the British artist Fauve Alice entitled ‘a hammer, a coin, a cry, a wish’ looks like a fragment of a dragon’s tail. Up close, it offers several different interpretations.
For some, it symbolises what money and greed can do to Nature. Others may be reminded of a tree trunk that stands close to the top of the St Hillarion Castle in the Pentadaktylos mountains. Not unlike Fauve’s piece, this wishing tree is bedecked with coins and a metallic coat of nails hammered into place by breathless visitors believing their pilgrim-like actions could bring them good luck, cure an illness or at least attest to the effort that marked their presence in the area.
“The artist does refer in her work to the tree at the St Hillarion Castle,”, explains art historian and researcher Esra Plumer Bardak, the curator of the Nimac show. “That is why this work is not only about the destruction of nature but also a kind of an oath you make for the future. There’s a very strong presence of collective wishing there.”
To date, Cyprus-born, British-educated Plumer Bardak has curated several large exhibitions both in the UK and here on both sides of the island. The Nimac show is made up of works by 16 emerging and established contemporary artists from both Cyprus and overseas. It marks the first time ever that Nimac has mounted an exhibition exclusively curated by a Turkish Cypriot. And while the exhibition opened a month ago with its own share of unusual controversy, it also sucessfully provoked one of the most interesting debates to have taken place within Cypriot artistic circles in recent years.
The expression A Slight Indisposition comes from Franz Kafka’s novella The Metamorphosis, the renowned story of a man who one day wakes up as a bug. Since first being published more than 100 years ago, words uttered by Gregor Samsa, the book’s main protagonist, have become cultural and literal shorthand for a very specific psychological-cum-social phenomenon – that of using a trivial excuse to mask a catastrophic reality.
“A slight indisposition, a dizzy spell, has prevented me from getting up,” Samsa says through the locked door to his concerned employer and family on realising that he has transformed into a monstrous bug.
His unsuspecting boss seeks to reassure him: “I hope it is nothing serious. On the other hand, I must also say that we business people, luckily or unluckily, however one looks at it, very often simply have to overcome a slight indisposition for business reasons.”
Plumer Bardak explains further: “The exhibition is something that I’ve been thinking about and building over the past two years. The idea started forming when the world celebrated the 100th anniversary of Kafka’s death [in 2024]. I started rereading Metamorphosis and thinking about the feelings and issues that it raises. And when I looked at the contemporary artistic practices in Cyprus, I saw a lot of overlaps. This is how the idea for this exhibition formed. So the concept came from me, and then I started talking to artists and exhibition designers and of course, all exhibitions need a place, and Nimac was an obvious choice – a beautiful venue, the longest running contemporary art space on the island, the heartbeat of the contemporarty Cypriot art world.”
Kafka, she acknowledges, wasn’t the only factor in her inspiration. She also drew on John Berger’s essay Why We Look at Animals, in which he explores how the ancient relationship between man and nature has broken down in the modern consumer age. Berger, she notes, points out that animals that once were at the centre of our existence, have since been marginalised and reduced to spectacle.
“It raises the question of that distance between human and non-human and how we as humans build that space,” she says, citing Stelios Kallinicou’s Sparrow as an example. Known for wandering around the island with a camera, Kallinicou’s work in the Nimac show consists of a small screen lying on the ground in a corner of the large exhibition hall. Only on close inspection does the viewer get to watch a video loop showing a small sparrow lying on its back, panting for breath. The screen is positioned astutely, an exact recreation, one imagines, of just how the artist first encountered and observed the exhausted bird.
“It’s a very arresting but subtle image. Something that one can easily walk past without noticing. But if you see it, it raises a lot of emotions, discomfort even,” Plumer Bardak suggests before expanding on the impact and the medium in which it is presented. “These small screens are constantly present in our daily lives nowadays. We constantly scroll through content on these screens that is maybe equally or even more disturbing, such as wars, conflict and famine. But we just scroll through them the same way we walk past the bird, don’t we?”
Going back to the title of the exhibition – A Slight Indisposition – she stresses that “it just resonates a lot with our philosophical, social, economic and ecological concerns about what humanity is at the moment in our current, constantly changing, world”.
The exhibition also features a number of works belonging to private and state collections.
Of these, perhaps the most iconic is Disasters of Wars by the partly Greek Cypriot, British artists Jake and Dinos Chapman. Consisting of 83 etchings and clearly based on Francisco de Goya’s graphic depiction of the Napoleonic occupation of Spain, the work gives free rein to the Chapmans’ unique drawing style and obsessions.
“This is an exceptionally strong art work – one of the quintessential works that represents human cruelty, violence, and war in all its forms but without any of its glory”, says Plumer Bardak. She is “truly excited” to have had it as part of this exhibition, noting how art critics “regard it as one of the works that has a sense of urgency that very few other contemporary work have.”
Plumer Bardak’s choice of artists is interesting and broadening – one wandered through the Nimac rooms seeing not only very familiar names but also those belonging to artists whose work, despite being well established on the international level, is only rarely encountered on the local scene.
“All exhibitions reflect works a curator is exposed to. So it’s not a matter of identity or ethnicity but a matter of the works that I’m connected with in terms of my research and interests,” she explains.
At least half of the works displayed at Nimac are by Turkish Cypriots, a significant feature of the exhibition in the opinion of Prio researcher, writer and artist Mete Hatay. “Nimac has done a good job at this show,” he says. “Not only do we see a rich selection of artists but also a rich and multigenerational selection of Turkish Cypriot artists which means we also see various ideas of the ‘metamorphosis’ among them. Because, as with any other community, the Turkish Cypriot community is not homogenous but is constantly changing which means its artists are constantly producing new ideas and creating new layers of historical interpretations.”
Among the best known Turkish Cypriot artists in the show is Emin Ciznel, whose display consists of two parts under the same title A Lost Moment. Both works belong to Cizenel’s multi-dimmensional project exploring Cypriot identity and nostalgia for the past and were executed 20 years ago. They now belongs to the Republic of Cyprus’ State Collection.
While the project focuses on the jasmine necklace ritual, familiar to Cypriots on both sides of the divide, and in general terms of metamorphosis can be looked at from the view point of constant opening and closing of the jasmine buds as well as the constant state of change, Hatay, for one, maintains that there is yet another interpretation.
“Yes, of course, it shows the constant change in that sense, but it also symbolises the 2003 Jasmine Revolution in the Turkish Cypriot community, the hope they had after the first crossing opened. All these mass movements – the mobilisation – all of it was named the Jasmine Revolution. In that sense, this is what the people saw – the opening of white jasmine petals and a wonderful smell and a possibility of peace. And how people were disappointed when it didn’t happen. This work talks about lost opportunities. It symbolises this lost opportunity of unification. But at the same time it doesn’t mean that it’s lost forever.”
That Cizenel’s work was featured in the exhibition came under heavy attack from some quarters angered that in 1984 his had been the design chosen for the ‘north Cyprus flag’, an emblem reviled by Greek Cypriots as the most hated symbol of the occupation. Nimac was accussed of hypocrisy, and when the exhibition opened a small demonstration was staged in protest at Cizenel’s inclusion among the selected artists.
An impassioned discussion blew up on social media around the whole issue with many sharp, embittered exchanges. According to Hatay, the fact that some of these clashing viewpoints were among Turkish Cypriots served to prove and underscore just how diverse the Turkish Cypriot community is.
It is worth noting here that in 2020, Hatay and well-known anthropologist of politics and law Rebecca Bryant co-authored Sovereignty Suspended, a book about building the so-called state in the north that approaches the chllenging subject from several different angles.
It is in this context that he makes a point of stressing Cizenel’s long support for a united island and delineates the Malia-born artist’s personal history of struggles and displacement. This is why he believes it is vital to understand the history of north Cyprus and to have an awareness of the conditions that existed there in the late 1970s and 1980s. Such an approach, he contends, is essentail if current attempts to firmly place the island’s unification on the international agenda are to be successful.
“We have to understand the difference between reunification and unification to start with. Reunification means going back to when the island was united. Unification is to take the realities of today and unite. When you say ‘reunification’ you ignore the agency of the other side. But this is not what we need. Because then what about Turkish Cypriots? You cannot create a partnership with a ghost. The truth is if we want to succeed we will need a multi-perspective and that means acknowledging one another’s respective histories. And in that sense that means acknowledging that the flag that Emin designed is part of the Turkish Cypriot history.”
The body of an 88-year-old British man was found inside a burnt-out vehicle on a dirt road in Avgorou on Saturday after a fire engulfed the car.
According to local media reports, the man, who lived in Pachna, had travelled to the area with his domestic worker to visit a dog shelter in the Famagusta district.
The reports said the pair became stranded after the vehicle’s wheels became stuck on a dirt road. The man is said to have made repeated attempts to free the vehicle before a fire broke out and spread from nearby reed beds to the car.
According to the reports, the man told the domestic worker to leave the vehicle and seek help before the blaze intensified.
His dog also died in the fire.
The circumstances surrounding the incident are under investigation.
Paphos winegrowers took to the streets on Saturday to protest over the government’s decision to limit compensation to only certain grape varieties affected by downy mildew, a move they say has left many producers in an untenable position.
“We ask and demand that all varieties be compensated. Winegrowers need financial support to be able to cope with the extremely difficult conditions that have been created,” said winegrowers’ representative Myros Yiagkou.
The agriculture ministry had earlier announced that damage declarations would be accepted only for the Mavro, Maratheftiko, Xynisteri and Vasilissa grape varieties, prompting strong objections from producers of other affected varieties, who have effectively been excluded from the compensation scheme.
The producers rejected the ministry’s assessment that those four varieties accounted for more than 50 per cent of the damage, insisting that several other varieties had also suffered total crop losses.
Panagrotikos Paphos district secretary Panikos Kaponas described the situation as “a total disaster”, saying agricultural organisations had written to the ministry calling for the immediate inclusion of all grape varieties in the compensation scheme.
The district secretary of the union of Cypriot farmers in Paphos, Herodotus Antoniadis, also called for immediate support measures, stressing that viticulture makes a significant contribution to the Cypriot economy.
He urged the government to compensate all affected varieties to ensure winegrowers could stay in business and “keep the Cypriot countryside alive”.
Local district government president Charalambos Pittokopitis likewise called on the government to support the agricultural sector, particularly the region’s wine industry, saying downy mildew had affected vineyards across the district regardless of grape variety.
He said the damage extended throughout the province and added that he had asked the agriculture ministry to carry out fresh inspections to determine the full extent of the losses. The ministry has confirmed that a new inspection will take place at the end of August, as the outbreak remains ongoing.
Downy mildew is a common fungal disease that affects grapevines and can severely reduce yields across entire wine-growing regions.
The disease causes yellow spots on leaves and is mostly prevalent in summer, when conditions are ideal for the fungus. The spores of the disease are spread by wind and rain, thereby infecting entire vineyards and crops.
Responding later on Saturday, the agriculture ministry said the compensation process had already begun and insisted it had closely monitored the outbreak since early May.
“Since early May, before the extent of the impacts became apparent, specialised officers of the agriculture ministry have been conducting daily on-site visits to all viticultural areas, systematically recording the progress of crops and the appearance of infestation,” the ministry said.
The ministry said specialist officers had carried out daily inspections across wine-growing areas to record the spread of the disease and assess crop damage. Additional inspections continued in recent days where weather conditions remained favourable to the disease, ensuring the final assessment was fully documented before compensation criteria were applied.
“The framework includes clearly defined and publicised criteria, which are applied uniformly and equally to all producers. For damage caused by diseases, such as downy mildew, aid can be paid when damage exceeding 50 per cent of the average production of similar crops in a wider area is detected, which consists of a cluster of communities with common cultural and morphological characteristics,” the ministry said.
The ministry said compensation would be paid through the agricultural production protection and insurance fund under a simplified procedure designed to speed up payments.
Since the fund’s establishment in 2019, the viticulture sector has contributed around €1.3 million, while receiving more than €6 million in compensation, mainly for damage caused by drought, heatwaves and hail.
Winegrowers will be able to submit claims between August 3 and August 24 through district agricultural offices and designated community councils.
A fire broke out in a house in Tochni in the early hours of Saturday morning, causing extensive damage to the living room and kitchen of the house.
According to the fire brigade, the smoke and the fire damaged the entire electrical installation and paintwork of the house.
Three fire engines were sent to respond to the incident.
An increase in on-call services and the staffing of a permanent cardiologist for the local hospital was at the centre of a meeting between the mayor of Polis Chrysochous Yiotis Papachristofi and Health Minister Neophytos Charalambides on Friday.
The ministry said that it intended to proceed with the recruitment of a second cardiologist for the Paphos hospital, so that the existing cardiologist could focus exclusively on covering the needs of Polis Chrysochous hospital. In the meantime, the hospital would maintain on-call hours to cover existing needs.
In addition, it was announced that an effort will be made to operate two ambulance crews on a 24-hour basis, while the hiring of two additional nurses is also planned.
Furthermore, the hospital’s laboratory operating hours will be extended and it will receive new equipment. For the radiological department, the minister said another radiologist is expected to be hired by the end of the year.
The meeting also addressed progress on the project to construct a new Polis Chrysochous hospital. According to the ministry, the tender for the construction works is expected to be launched in October 2026, with the contract awarded by March 2027.
Once the new hospital is completed, a significant increase in staffing is planned, with numbers expected to rise to 120, compared to the 65 currently working at the existing hospital.
The Famagusta district court on Saturday remanded six suspects for six days over the alleged kidnapping of a 20-year-old man earlier this week.
The suspects – three 19-year-olds, a 20-year-old, a 26-year-old and a 27-year-old – were arrested under court warrants on Friday.
Police said the incident took place on the evening of July 29, when the victim met a group of people at a location in the Famagusta district.
According to police, the group demanded money from the 20-year-old and threatened him.
They then allegedly forced him into a car and drove him to another location in the district before releasing him a short time later.
Police investigations are continuing.
A wooden restaurant warehouse in Ayia Napa was completely destroyed after a fire broke out in a reed bed on Thursday, with two adjacent buildings also sustaining damage.
“At 4.08pm yesterday afternoon, the fire brigade responded to extinguish a fire in a reed bed and a wooden restaurant warehouse in Ayia Napa,” fire brigade spokesman Andreas Kettis said in a post on X.
The fire destroyed the warehouse including its contents such as electrical appliances, chairs and tables and also affected two nearby storage facilities storing electrical goods.
An investigation into the causes of the fire has been launched.
Two suspects were arrested at Larnaca airport on Friday in connection with the attempted murder of a 43-year-old man in Nicosia earlier this week.
According to the police, the suspects, aged 30 and 41, were arrested on court warrants as soon as they landed in Cyprus.
The case relates to an incident on July 29, when shots were fired at the victim’s car as he was driving through Nicosia.
Investigations into the case are ongoing.
On Saturday, the weather will be overwhelmingly clear with temperatures reaching up to 41 degrees Celsius inland, around 32 degrees on the north, west and southwest coasts, around 36 degrees on the rest of the coast and 32 degrees in the higher mountains.
Winds will blow mainly southwest to northwest and initially be variable, light to moderate, with a speed between 3 and 4 on the Beaufort scale. The sea will be slightly rough.
The weather will remain mostly clear tonight as temperatures drop to around 24 degrees Celsius inland and on the coast and to 19 degrees in the higher mountains.
Winds will gradually become mainly north-west to north-east, weak at 3 Beaufort, and the sea will be calm to slightly rough.
On Sunday, Monday and Tuesday, it will be mainly clear with no significant change in temperature expected.
I come from the javascript web dev world and was learning golang for last more than 1 year. taking it seriously for last few months. but when i see the job boards looking for backend engineers in golang, it's all "senior". is it only me? or is it only in golang? or the market is so saturated rn? no one will hire someone in a senior role without any professional experience obv. so how do i even get into the market?
| Been mulling a little bit if it's worth me adding arena allocators into phpscript or at least consider adding them more seriously. My words above the line, some grok research below the line in context. Feel free to skip the latter parts if LLM output is not your thing, I found it more useful for the contextual summary and added missing/extra/wider thoughts above the fold. [link] [comments] |
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