I will deal only with the aspect with which I am most familiar – that of ‘partial deafness’ where the problem only becomes obvious in conversation. The sufferer from partial hearing loss is embarrassed, repeatedly having to say “Pardon? I’m sorry but I did not quite hear what you said”, or words to that effect.  This can result in a number of responses:-

1. The speaker may repeat more slowly and clearly what they said.
2. He or she may shout whilst answering the request.
3. The speaker may dismiss a request with a wave of the hand.
4. The request by the sufferer may well cause  unconcealed mirth on the part of some people present. Even if the speaker’s diction is good, it often becomes unclear in a room full of other ambient noise, and requests for repetition from the partially deaf listener are made with increasing frequency.

Of those responses mentioned above the first one is the only response which indicates an appreciation of the problem, the others reveal a lack of understanding by the ignorant, cruel or unkind. Yet if the partially deaf were, instead, partially blind and were seeking assistance in reading small print – most people would be sympathetic and helpful.

What the ‘audience’ does not understand is that ‘Hearing Aids’ are merely ‘Amplifiers’, which amplify electronically a sound (including speech) but do NOT clarify the sound, so someone who is softly spoken, whispering or with indistinct or slurred speech will simply have the sibilance in their ‘voice’ amplified. Modern speech patterns with rapid delivery and a blurring of consonants from one word to the next, make distinguishing key words in a sentence quite hard, especially if the context is unclear. As they follow a group discussion, this can put the ‘hard of hearing’ a sentence or two behind everyone else. This is particularly common when the hearing loss has been comparatively recent, for example age-related, so that they do not have a lifetime of ‘learning to compensate’ to ‘overcome’ their disability.

Another thing to understand is that, in some cases, the partial loss of hearing may only affect one aspect e.g.:-

1. The inability to hear ‘low volume’ speech.
2. their tonal range is affected.
3. the pitch at which voices work – especially in a room full of other noises or conversations.

Laughter is certainly an inappropriate response to any disability and likely to provoke an angry response. Before laughing at a person with a partial hearing problem, consider how you would feel in their place.  Remember too, that when someone speaks more loudly than you do, it may not mean that they are shouting – it may be that they are instinctively raising their voice to the level it is comfortable for them to hear – in the hope that the people around them will follow suit.

In a Business meeting, clarity of speech is essential, especially when you are trying to ‘sell’ yourself and your business, and the speaker needs to remember that no two people have the same hearing capabilities. The volume, therefore,  must equal clarity, which is where the pitch comes into play. The tone should be modulated so that it is comfortable for everyone.

Clues to whether you are succeeding in communicating include:

• No-one in your audience is staring fixedly at your mouth and frowning in a concentrated way.
• No-one in your audience is looking down at their paperwork and reading the notes you have given them instead of looking at you
• No-one in your audience is doodling or staring away from you because they have given up trying to hear you and are bored
• No-one in your audience is asking their neighbour what you said – or constantly interrupting your flow with requests for repetition.

Remember also, when you are ‘selling’, that the person most interested could be someone with hearing problems and if they cannot hear clearly what you are saying, you may well lose out on the ‘sale’.

Still think that very few of your clients and colleagues are likely to have a hearing problem? Then you might be interested in these statistics from the RNID:-

Deaf and hard of hearing adults in the UK 

The most recent estimated figures for the number of deaf and hard of hearing adults in the UK are: 

Total number of deaf and hard of hearing people:  8,945,000

• 2,474,000 aged 16 to 60.
• 6,471,000 aged over 60.

 Total number of people with mild to moderate deafness: 8,257,000

• 2,366,000 aged 16 to 60.
• 5,891,000 aged over 60.

 Total number of people with severe to profound deafness: 688,000 

• 108,000 aged 16 to 60.
• 580,000 aged over 60.

 Age-related hearing loss

The most common type of hearing loss in the UK is among people who are gradually losing their hearing as part of the ageing process. 

Of over 70 year-olds in the UK, a total of 71.1% have some kind of hearing loss:

• 26.7% have mild hearing loss.
• 36.8% have moderate hearing loss.
• 6.3% have severe hearing loss.
• 1.3% have profound hearing loss.

 A total of 41.7% of over 50 year-olds in the UK have some kind of hearing loss:

• 21.6% have mild hearing loss.
• 16.8% have moderate hearing loss.
• 2.7% have severe hearing loss.
• 0.6% have profound hearing loss.

 It might be worth checking your own hearing Deafness creeps up unnoticed and acknowledging your own weakness early in its advance, you might avoid the embarrassment of becoming a figure of fun.

Stephen Timms, Treasury minister in charge of the Digital Britain plan, yesterday revealed he will introduce the law in the next Finance Bill.

Mr Timms said: “It is vital for jobs and growth that Britain has a world-class digital infrastructure.”

The £6-a-year levy on fixed phone lines – generating up to £175million annually – will subsidise next generation broadband networks in areas where they would not otherwise be viable.

But Jeremy Hunt, shadow culture secretary, said: “Slapping on a broadband tax is an old economy solution to a new economy problem.”

And Steve Weller, from uSwitch.com, said: “We are dismayed. If the Government truly intends to tax home phone users to fund the universal roll-out of broadband, this is a classic case of robbing Peter to pay Paul.”

Article from Daily Mirror – By Allison Martin 24/09/2009

 This holiday, which was in June when the temperatures were rising for Summer, came about as a last minute booking.  I was speaking to my friend late one evening, saying I was ready for a holiday, then found myself on a flight at 11:00 the following morning arriving at Larnaca in the late afternoon.  I was also informed by my friend that it was ‘hot and sticky’ and to a degree (33) this was true though I have been ‘hotter and stickier’ back in London on the odd occasion.  Having arrived we then drove around Larnaca in order to get home and found that the traffic could put Oxford Street to shame.

One of the Beaches at Akrotiri looking across the Bay.

Being only a week holiday it did not leave a great deal of time to go ‘sightseeing’ or even spending a weekend elsewhere but I enjoyed the time and, most certainly, the company.  My friend and her family live ‘behind the gates’ in RAF Akrotiri and I wandered fairly freely around the base with the obvious restrictions of the Military Areas and there was the NAAFI and a few small shops, one of which, Helena’s Clothes, is where I have bought quite a few casual shirts.  We also went to Pafos where, amongst other things, we had an evening meal at ‘The Pelican’ along the quayside near the Crusader’s Fort and I will quite happily say that ‘The Pelican’ does lay a very nice table.

 It is evident that the temperatures get hotter towards August and then gradually after 6 weeks of intense heat, begin to cool down towards the November rains and with this in mind one should dress according to the climate and the temperature.  I think the fact that I am on holiday and casually dressed may have something to do with my not ‘feeling the heat’ for the temperatures are certainly in the 30’s although there is a breeze (and ceiling fan) which does take the edge off.

Lemessos, a walk alongside the Bay towards the Centre of Town.

I think that if you dress sensibly then there should be no problems, I saw a ‘Tourist’ walking down a street in Pafos, licking an ice-cream, who was topless and wearing Nylon shorts which were clinging to the inside – not a pretty sight – nor I imagine all that comfortable.

I have a collection of shirts which are Rayon, Poly Cotton and Cotton, the best fabric for trousers is Cotton and any shirt of the materials mentioned should be all right provided they are larger than you would normally wear, for instance, I am a ‘Medium’ size whilst most of my shirts are ‘XXL’ which means they do not ‘cling’ even when buttoned and worn outside the trousers.  Cyprus is not an Island for the ‘Fashion Conscious’ it is an Island to enjoy and where you can enjoy yourself for the ‘Locals’ are friendly, polite and courteous – certainly in my experience, having – as they do – ‘first-hand’ experience of the British, we were the last Nation to occupy Cyprus (aside from the bits still Turkish occupied since 1974) though they are not as bitter about us.  It is also to be sincerely hoped that the two communities can get back together and resolve any ‘problems’ they feel they have.

 If you have never visited the land of Aphrodite you are truly missing out on an experience and it is an experience well worth enjoying, for the Cypriots are, as I have said, a friendly people, the food is excellent, the weather is gorgeous and the welcome is always warm.

If you are travelling with adults then it should not particularly worry you what time of year you visit as the Island enjoys around 300 days of sunshine, and I have not seen clearer – or bluer skies anywhere.  On the other hand, if you have children then perhaps it is best to come when the ‘Theme Parks’ and ‘Fairground Rides’ are open offering cool water and shade – you will still be welcome.

A Hotel poolside in Kyrenia                    Windsurfing in Akrotiri Bay

The Profit and Loss Account includes such items such as ‘Sales’, ‘Purchases’ and ‘Direct Expenses’ such as Promotional and Miscellaneous Expense are shown in one part whilst the second part bears the Overheads such as Licence Fees, Motor Expenses, Printing & Stationery and Postage & Telephones to name a few.  The sum arrived at by deducting Purchases & Direct Expenses from your Sales income would form a Sub Total to which would be added to, or subtracted from, the total of the ‘Overheads’ to give you a nett Balance on your Profit & Loss Account.

The Balance Sheet is the Final Account to be drawn up for the Year End.  It consists of your ‘Fixed Assets’ such as ‘Office Equipment’, ‘Furniture & Fittings’, ‘Motor Vehicles’ where they are the Property of the Company, to name a few and the respective Depreciation Accounts.  To these are added your ‘Current Assets’ such as your ‘Debtors’, ‘Bank Account’ and ‘VAT Liability’ and the sum total of these two categories becomes your ‘Total Assets.  The next sum would be ‘Current Assets less Current Liabilities’ which is deducted from, or added to, your ‘Total Assets’ and is shown as ‘Total Assets less Current Liabilities’.  To Balance your ‘Total Assets Less Current Liabilities’ you need to show on the opposing side of your Balance Sheet the figure you have for ‘Reserves’ plus ‘Profit & Loss Account’ which is the Balance of that Account within the Nominal Ledger.

In the ‘Month-end’ Accounts regarding the Nominal Ledger all entries are posted to it by a Journal Voucher.  This entails going through each ‘Day Book’ and Cash Book and completing the Journal Voucher by entering on to it the Totals of each column or, in the case of the ‘Sundries’ column, the individual amounts against their Nominal Code numbers and ‘posting’ these entries to the Nominal Ledger account.  Sample vouchers are shown below:-

This Journal Voucher covers items taken from the Purchase Day Book.

 Whilst this one relates to the Sales Day Book

This Journal deals with the items in the Cash Book

And finally, this covers the Petty Cash Book expense.

There may be other Journal Vouchers you may need to raise, for instance – Depreciation, and that may well cover more than one account in the Nominal, then there may be Pre-payments which require a Journal Voucher.

 When all the Journal Vouchers have been ‘posted’ to the Nominal Ledger you then go through this Ledger balancing each individual account or ‘Ruling off’ where there is no balance.

Once you have finally balanced each and every Account in the Nominal Ledger you then have to prepare a Trial Balance – I should add here that when I had to produce ‘Month End Accounts’ the Trial Balance was the final point.  This is a List of the Balances extracted, by Account number and Name, and listed as a schedule showing the Debit Balances in the left-hand monetary column with the Credit Balances shown in the right-hand column.

The Totals of both the Debit and Credit Columns MUST be the same – if not, you have then to begin checking all your entries from the beginning in order to find the mistake.  One of the most common of errors is ‘Transposition’, this is usually in the ‘pence’ of an entry such as writing £89.92 as £89.29 which would give you discrepancy of .63, another is posting entries, from the Journal Voucher, on the wrong side such as an item of £100.00 shown on the Journal Voucher as a Credit which was posted as a Debit, your difference here can be £50.00 or £200.00, either way, the error has to be found and corrected.

The last thing to do in the Nominal Ledger is to ‘close and transfer’ all expense accounts EXCEPT those relating to the Asset Accounts and their Depreciation Accounts.  This is done via journal entry on which you list all the balances as Debits and Credits which close the individual accounts with the Total of all the entries being posted to a ‘Profit & Loss Account’ within the Nominal Ledger.  It is this total that you show on your Balance Sheet with ‘Reserves’, and which should balance your ‘Balance Sheet’.

 The first thing that must be done is to go through the Purchase Ledger and balance each of the accounts which appear in them.  These samples give an idea as to what should be done and what to expect.                                                                                       

In the case of the account of William Bloggs & Son when January and February accounts were prepared there was no necessity to ‘balance off’ in this manner as the £28.15 shown as a January purchase would have sufficed as it was.

 In the case of J. Henderson, you will see the balance brought forward is shown on the Debit Side, this is due to an error in calculation and will be put right when the    next payment made will be this amount short.  Having completed going through the Purchase Ledger you will need to prepare a schedule of Debtors showing how much is due to each Supplier, this means compiling a list and going thru the Purchase Ledger extracting only the balances, this is completed in the manner of an ‘Analysis’ where you show the debt to due to each of your Suppliers by individual month and the Total as shown in the following example.

You will need to keep this to hand for when you begin to Balance the Purchase Control Account in the Nominal Ledger.  The Control Account  should agree with this Schedule, if it doesn’t you will have to back track to find the discrepancy correct the error.

Having finished with the Purchase Ledger, the next thing to look at is the Sales Ledger and, again, we repeat the exercise of balancing each of the accounts.  These two samples hopefully will give you an idea as to what should be done and what to expect, for the second of the two is not straightforward.

Here we had the months of January and February Invoices due and the account was balanced as shown with the balance being settled in March.

With this account you will see that only two Invoices were ‘posted’ in February with the Account ‘balanced off’ at the close of February.  Subsequently there was a partial payment of £8750.00 received against this account which would indicate that there is a query or problem running which you would need to know about.

As with the Purchase Ledger, having balanced each of the Sales Ledger Accounts you will need to produce an ‘Age Analysis’, this is a list of the customers who have yet to settle accounts with their debt shown in total and then extended out to individual months.  This helps when letters are sent to remind them of their debt.  Again, it would be wise to keep this to one side with the Purchase Ledger list of balances until you get into the Nominal Ledger.

Again, you will need to keep this to hand for when you begin to Balance the Nominal Ledger, as the Sales Control Account must agree with this Analysis and if there is a difference then you will have to find the error and correct it.

You will also need to agree the ‘Cash Control Account’ to the Balance shown in the Cash Book.  Again, if there is a discrepancy it must be found and corrected.

With regard to the V.A.T. Control Account if the majority of your clients are within the U.K. I would normally expect you to be paying V.A.T.  For a Governmental form this is one of the simplest forms any Government has produced.  In order to help I have shown a ‘dummy’ which I have used in the past:-

As you can see, the amount of VAT you have charged your clients for the months shown is entered against the respective month and then totalled.  You treat the VAT on Purchases and Petty Cash in a similar manner.  Normally your VAT on Sales would exceed the VAT on Purchases and Petty Cash in which case the total shown against “Amount due to or from H.M.R.C.” would be payable to them.  The second part of this form should help with the second half of the Return, you simply enter the Total and VAT amounts from your Sales Day Book and calculate the ‘Nett’ amount for each month and then repeat for the Purchase Day Book and Petty Cash Book and show the Totals in the respective ‘Boxes’ on the Return.

 You may occasionally claim VAT back from H.M.R.C. where you have had a ‘poor’ month or so on Sales or for other reasons. 

 If you ever have a ‘Phone call from your VAT Inspector asking to come and see your books – DON’T panic, it’s his job and he is only making sure that you are recording VAT correctly – if you aren’t don’t worry, he will simply put you right and – unless you are deliberately ‘fiddling the books’ – they are nice people and can be very helpful.

 Having entered the receipts in to the Cash Book you then need to complete the necessary ‘Paying-In’ slip for the Bank listing on the reverse the name of

each of the payers and the amounts they have paid and the total of these is then transferred to the front of the slip in ‘Total Cheques’ with any cash being shown in the boxes above then totalled and, adding on the cheques a final Total at the bottom.  This is then taken to the Bank, either by yourself or a messenger, and paid in over the counter. 

 The next course of action regarding the Cash Book is to ‘Post’ any items which appear in the ‘Sales Ledger’ column to your Clients accounts in the Sales Ledger, ‘Closing off’ each account where there is no Balance left after the entry is posted, this is simply done with a RED line across the monetary columns only.  You may also occasionally have an instance of money being refunded to you by a supplier and your course of action is to post from either

the ‘Purchase Ledger’ column, if you have one, or from whichever column it has been extended to, in to your Suppliers account indicating which Invoice or Invoices this refund refers to.

When it comes to paying your Bills you may have certain times in a month when you settle certain Suppliers settling with other Suppliers at a different date, in one office I worked in I had four Fridays on which I made payments to all my Suppliers – rather than settle all in one day.  You might well experience the same thing.

 When you are ready to begin paying your Suppliers you will first need to balance their account in your ‘Purchase Ledger’ and prepare remittance advices, with a copy for yourself, showing the ‘Outstanding Invoices’, you either prepare this yourself or, hopefully, have a secretary/typist who can do it for you – if you have one, CHECK her work and make sure it is correct because when you have drawn the Cheque for the correct amount and wait for it to be signed, you will feel a fool if your Director finds a mistake.  I promise you – THEY DO.  So, having got all the Cheques signed and attached to the Remittances all you do now is put them in the post.  Now you have to ‘write up’ the ‘Payments’ (Right Hand) side of the Cash Book with Cheque amount in the ‘Total’ and the extension in to the ‘Purchase Ledger’ column and then ‘Post’ to the Purchase Ledger ‘closing off’ accounts where possible.  Do not forget to ‘Cast and cross cast’ your Cash Book page by page, it will help you in the long run.  You may also be required to write Cheques for other items which are not in the ‘Purchase Ledger’ but will still be entered in to the Cash Book and extended to a Nominal Ledger ‘Column’, the method of dealing with these comes later.

 You then attach your copies of the Remittances to the Invoices you have paid and transfer them to a ‘Paid’ file.

 You will, each month, have to reconcile your Cash Book with the Bank Statements which will have been received by you or the Chief Cashier.  There are two ways of doing this, you either reconcile Cash Book to

Bank Statements or Vice Versa.  The first thing to do is to ‘Tick’ every entry on the Bank Statement against the same entry in your Cash Book, at the end of this you will have un-ticked items in your Cash Book and un-ticked items on your Bank Statement.  If you have any Standing Orders and or Direct Debits on your Statement but not in your Cash Book you must enter these straight away which will eliminate one set of figures.  The next step is the Reconciliation itself, an example is given below:-

 It would be wise to keep these Reconciliations on a file for reference should there ever be a query.

We now come to the Petty Cash Book.  This is for minor expense such Tea, Coffee and other sundry items which occur on a daily basis.  The way this works is that the person responsible for looking after Petty Cash is ‘given’ a ‘Float’ of, let’s say, £1,000.00.  This amount is kept in a Petty Cash Tin, in various denominations of Notes and Coin and always kept in the safe unless being used, NEVER leave it on your desk whilst you are not around.  At the end of a period, say a month, you will need to ‘re-imburse’ the ‘Float’, this is done by simply adding up all the Petty Cash Vouchers for expense to arrive at Total A, then similarly you add up any I.O.U.’s for Total B, next you take the cash and add up each denomination of Coin and Notes to arrive at Total C and completing a Reconciliation form similar to that shown below which is based on a form I drew up for my own purposes.  In my case the ‘Float’ was for £1,000.00.

 As you will see the amount of the Cheque to replenish is the nett amount after deducting the Vouchers, I.O.U’s, Notes and Coin. 

 In this Reconciliation I have ‘cheated’ slightly, whilst you do not need to list the ‘Vouchers’ as they will be attached to the Reconciliation, the I.O.U.’s will remain with the Petty  Cash until settled by the borrower.  You will need to list the denominations of Coin and Notes with the amount of each shown beside it.  The cheque is made payable to ‘Cash’ with ‘Please Pay Cash’ written in the crossing on the cheque which is initialled by the Signatory to the cheque.  It is wise to take the reconciliation with you when you want the Cheque signed as it may well be asked for.  Again, it is wise to keep these Reconciliations on file as well.

 One thing to remember with regards to the Petty Cash ‘Float’ is that you will be held responsible for any losses irrespective of how much the ‘Float’ is.

 This done, your next step is to enter these items into a ‘Purchase Ledger’ in which you should have individual accounts for each Supplier where you then ‘post’ each Invoice to the credit (right-hand) side of their account, showing in the ‘Purchase Day Book’ the account reference for each Supplier as you ‘post’ to the ‘Purchase Ledger’ cross referencing with the page number of the ‘Purchase Day Book’ shown against the amount ‘posted’.

 It is of help to yourself if you get into the habit of ‘Casting and cross casting’ weekly, that is adding up the columns and then their totals across to check the Main total.

 It is also to your benefit to keep any and all filing up to date.  Remember, all documents which substantiate your accounts have to be kept, by Law, for  Seven Years.

 The next book of entry is your ‘Sales Day Book’, this is entered in similar fashion showing the Date, Customer, Invoice Number, the Total, V.A.T and then the Net amount extended into the appropriate column for that source of income.

And then, as with the purchases, you ‘post’ each item into the respective Customer’s individual accounts in the ‘Sales Ledger’ showing the Invoice amount on the debit (left-hand) side noting the account reference against the entry in the ‘Sales Day Book’ and the page number of the ‘Sales Day Book’ against the item ‘posted’.

 Credit Notes can be entered, IN RED, into the respective ‘Day Book’ and ‘posted’ along with the Invoices remembering to deduct the Credits as you go and posting them on the opposite side of the account in question in the ‘Purchase Ledger’.  This said, your employer may have installed a book simply for Credits against Purchases and a separate one for Credits on Sales.

 Again it would be to your benefit to cast and cross cast on a weekly basis.

 If you are a member of an Accounts Department it may well be that you would look after either one or both of the ‘Day Books’ just referred to. 

 If this is the case then you must be prepared to deal with all and any queries that arise from your work with the other Departments within your company.

 However, I shall continue as the subject is far from complete.

 The idea of this article is to give any would-be book-keeper an insight as to what can be expected of them, though firstly they should decide if they wish to take ‘Articles’ with a firm of Chartered Accountants or go straight into the commercial side as a member of an Accounts Department.  If you wish to take ‘Articles’ then the suggestion I would make would be for you to approach a Local firm of Accountants to see if they can take you on or perhaps offer you further advice on how to pursue this course.  If, on the other hand, you decide to go into the commercial side then it would be an idea to find a college who can provide a course on Book-keeping either as an ‘Evening Course’ or, if you are fortunate enough, a ‘Day Course’, and – it is in this respect that I shall try and give you an idea of what you can look forward to. 

 Briefly put, book-keeping is the recording of Income and Expense incurred in the day to day running of any business, irrespective of size, with the intention of showing whether or not that business is making a profit or loss, and also to provide accounts for H.M. Inspector of Taxes.

 Before I begin, the one thing to remember here is that Suppliers Invoices which include V.A.T. must bear the Suppliers V.A.T. Registration Number, and similarly with Sales Invoices to your Clients, if your Company is registered then your Company’s V.A.T. Registration Number must be shown on your Invoices.

 The assumption in this article is that the reader will be using ‘Manual Accounts’ and not a Computer, in which case the best place to begin is with the books which would be required, these are:-

      1)    A ‘Purchase Day Book’

      2)    A ‘Sales Day Book’

      3)    A ‘Cash Book’

      4)    A’ Petty Cash Book’

These are referred to as the ‘Books of Prime Entry’ and, therefore, you would also need:

      5)    A ‘Purchase Ledger’

      6)    A ‘Sales Ledger’

      7)    A ‘Nominal Ledger’

It is from your Nominal Ledger that your ‘Final Accounts’ are made up.

 In following posts I shall attempt to give, in brief and concise detail, your methods of entry and how you should follow through an action.

I am staying with friends on the Akrotiri Peninsular and the Lady of the house posed the question, why do the British want to go abroad to warmer climate in summer? Which is roughly when there is a decent spell of weather at home. It would make more sense if people took their “holidays in the sun” at a different time of the year ~ though one does appreciate employers do have a say as to when they want their staff to work. The only difficulty, if such it can be called, is that you are looking at approximately a four-hour flight (on top of a two hour wait – at either end if your taxi is late!) at the end of which you are two hours ahead of British Time – as Cyprus follows British Summer Time rules, I flew into Pafos which is about an hour run from Akrotiri.

Travelling around the island with a chauffeuse or a hire car seems to be relatively easy ~ certainly outside of the towns ~ and causes no great hardships, so there are plenty of opportunities for sight-seeing, and as for photography whatever your equipment ~ there shouldn’t be too much in the way of  problems there either irrespective of what one likes to photograph. As the Cypriots drive, like the British, on the left, it is a simple transfer of skills to Cypriot Roads. Newcomers to driving on the island, however, can be lulled into the false sense of security that it is as safe to drive as in the UK – which in the past it may well have been… but in an era of fast cars, slow goats and a general local contempt for road “rules”, some caution is advised. However, the ‘tourist’ sites, out of season, are virtually deserted so you don’t have the problem of ‘bumping into’ the world and his wife, or asking them to move while you absorb the quiet history that surrounds you ~ they are all at home whilst you are enjoying yourself.  Why else might one think about a holiday during the off peak season? OK, in the quiet seasons some of the hot summer attractions are unavailable. The children may grumble that the Aqua-land is closed or the beach is too quiet… but on the other hand, the flights are cheaper, the hotel deals are generous and the welcome is sincere, regardless of season. The Cypriots that I have come across are a lovely people, friendly and speak English very well ~ as they have tolerated the British on the island for some years. The muleteers the British Army recruited to help them in the Egyptian Campaign two centuries ago came mostly from these shores, so the Cypriots have learned a polite patience with us as a nation over long association.

On arriving I was taken for a meal in Pafos, to taste my first piece of real Cyprus in a lovely local fish restaurant, only to find the waiter who was serving us had spent some of his youth in London ~ my home of origin ~ and according to my hostess he had a better grasp of English Colloquialisms than she did… so there you go!

 Sidney Skinner can be contacted here