PEOPLE who have been complaining that it ‘doesn’t feel like Christmas this year’ obviously do not live in Kiti.
For the fifth year running, residents of the Larnaca district village have been privileged to have their very own magical display of Christmas lights courtesy of 66-year-old Peter Holman, leaving no doubt as to the season.
Resembling somewhat of a winter wonderland, the Briton has decorated his entire home on Mykonos Street and two other adjacent houses with no less than 10,000 lights and over 70 Christmas figures.
The Briton, along with his wife Sally, and neighbours Val Iloucery and Mick Marchant spent three weeks putting up the display.
“It took a long time and a lot of effort but it was well worth it,” said Holman.
“The children had been getting very excited and saying how much they liked the dazzling lights. It was so nice to hear them complimenting [the display] because after all, Christmas is about the children isn’t it?”
The foursome is hoping to raise money for the children of Kiti Community.
Last year, they raised funds in the region of €220 and €240.
“It was disappointing but we’re hoping that this year we’ll raise a lot more than that because we’ve already matched that amount and there are still quite a lot of days to go before we stop collecting on January 7,” he said.
The 66-year-old and his wife first started collecting the lights and decorations 10 years ago.
“We did the same in England for six years and raised funds for the Radcliffe Hospital in Oxford for cancer research,” he said.
“When we came to Cyprus, we decided to do the same thing here and had £5,000 worth of collections and equipment shipped over.”
In November, tragedy struck the Holmans when they discovered delinquents had vandalised their vast collection while it was being stored at the old primary school. At least one third had been damaged or stolen and the 66-year-old feared the display would look a lot sparser this year.
Not one to be deterred from his mission of brightening up the village during the festive season and to raise money for the community and local primary school, Homan travelled back to the UK and bought an additional €1,200 worth of decorations to replenish his collection. His neighbours also contributed their own decorations and lights.
“The rest I managed to repair as best I could with all my spare parts. Also I felt that the show should go on regardless of what happened last month for the children’s sake,” he said.
“We were told this is the biggest private collection of Christmas lights on the island,” said a clearly chuffed Peter.
In fact people travel from all over the island to view the display, including tourists en route to Larnaca airport, he said.
The couple is expecting their electricity bill to be around €130 for the period the lights are on. Their neighbours will foot their own electricity bills.
The village priest switched on the lights last Tuesday. They will remain on display until January 8.
