Volunteering in Cyprus

 My Final week in Cyprus This last week that I write from home did not consist of much hands on work but collecting, organising and distributing all the photos, information and surveying that we had into the necessary files. We finished our Orthodox Church and Green Man tourist trail, added everything we collected to the ‘water route’ tourist trail that will be further developed, and have contributed to the archives for the lost village of Pano Drys and the Phoenician tombs in the surrounding area. To begin excavations on these sites the community council needs a university to lead the project to get permission from the department of antiquities. On my last day in Cyprus, we finished with some hands-on work. We were to help clear a nursery forest of the weeds that were taking over. This nursery forest is to encourage the growth of more trees that have been struggling due to increasingly dry winters. The most important one in this area being the almond tree that has been cultiva...

 Monday 24 th March Today we were tasked with walking a route that Martin has had in his plans for a while but hasn’t been able to complete. This will be a ‘water route’ that interested tourists can walk and identify water cisterns from different time periods. These routes that we have been working on developing are a part of the European IHERIT project that seeks to preserve, restore and manage cultural heritage. On this route we found water cisterns from the Roman empire, Byzantine, Venetian, up to the British rule of Cyprus. We marked there locations on the map and took photos. We ended the day with a hike up a mountain, which was spectacular. Tuesday – In the morning we went to the Olive Mill to learn some more traditional skills, here we were using lino cuts, paint and t shirts to create traditional artwork on modern clothing in the ‘Lefkaritika’ style. We were using and learning about some of the cultural symbols found in Cyprus. We used for example, the marguerite, an e...