I mentioned George in one of my previous blog posts and I wanted to tell part of his story, but I needed the chance to connect with him again so I could share some of the photos of his labor. George is a native Larnaca Cypriot around 53 years old. He has a wife, two sons age 26 and 14 and a daughter I believe is 23. He was born in a house about a 7 minute walk from the beach where he lived his entire life until moving out on his own. His parents retired elsewhere and left him their home which was one of a series of row homes next to an apartment building. Through his family he was able to raise up enough money (around 100,000 Euros) to purchase another one of the row homes just two doors down. It was seriously dilapidated, had not been lived in for twenty years, and the mud brick interior walls were crumbling. But George had a plan. He was going to make a small bed and breakfast type hotel out of it. Small studio style apartments for tourists to stay in. This was in 2018, and over two years of work, he managed to reconstruct and renovate the property. There is another very tiny row home in between his new business and his childhood home which he hopes to buy at auction sometime in the near future. He is going to connect all three homes together, each with a few rooms to rent, and have a bar for alcohol and snacks, a backyard pool and a rooftop jacuzzi. But for now, he has only managed to complete the first building, his initial investment property. He gave it the name Magdalene, after his only daughter who will help him run it once he manages to complete all phases of his master plan.

He told me the ‘Magdalene’ was built in 1935. When he bought it, he did a walk through video recording the very poor shape it was in along with the extremely old fashioned means of living the previous owners lived by. The ‘kitchen’ did not have a sink, but a very large piece of limestone slab that was carved out as a basin or a sink. Little piping in the home for basic running water. Roof that had collapsed. All the walls except for the front stone walls were mud brick and plaster that had began to crumble from neglect. There were a few charming parts, like the front foyer had a tile pseudo-mosaic which he made sure to incorporate in the hostel, although slightly modified to fit symmetrically with the new wall layout. He repurposed as much material as he could out of the red bricks and lower stone foundational walls. Even wooden beams that had been buried inside the mudbrick for nearly 80 years was restored and crafted into furniture lighting. Old doors were restored and modified for glass windows and bronze door handles. George had to teardown the back half of the home, but he rebuilt it to his specifications and added a second level and connected that level through a metal welded semi-spiral staircase. George and a few of his friends did most of the work, but George said he spent several hours a day for nearly two years to see his dream come true.

I spent several weeks in Cuba back in 2017 and was blown away by some of the clever ingenuity of local Cubanos in constructing make shift lodging for tourists to stay in so they could earn some extra money. They had little material and money to work with and sometimes the results left something to be desired. But I’ve now had a chance to see how Cypriots approach the same challenge of keeping and updating old structures, but with greater access to materials and capital to see their projects through to the end. It was wonderful to meet George and talk with him the several days I lived in his lodge. He would sit down and make you a cup of Cypriot frappe and ask you tons of questions about your life while also sharing openly about his. If you want to stay in Larnaca after the excavation is over, I would very much recommend checking in with George and see how far he has come in his project and if he has any rooms available for you. His number is post on the sign out front.

-Adam E.