Cyprus must not lose its hospitality

Sir,

I have been visiting Paphos to stay with English friends just about every year for the last 25 years. During that time, enjoying food and drink has changed from visiting a few tavernas to the great range of hotels and restaurants that exist now. And with remarkably few exceptions this has meant friendliness and being well looked after wherever we have been.

But this year we went for our usual lunch to a large open air restaurant overlooking the sea, a place that my English friends normally visit several times a year and which I have always very much enjoyed.  We tried to make a quite relaxed but justified complaint about the state of the fish we were served. The manager who knew us quite well just refused to listen and walked away.  This was a remarkable display of rudeness and a total lack of professional ability – a great disappointment to us.

I must say that we had also visited a locally-run restaurant up in the hills where we were admirably looked after. But I am told that just after I returned home you published an article headed ‘Smile’ in which you encouraged some of the locals to be more welcoming, and it would be a sad day for Paphos, if even in a few instances, visitors are not given their usual welcome.

Basil Mosenthal 

The Cyprus Mail is the only English-language daily newspaper published in Cyprus. It was established in 1945 and today, with its popular and widely-read website, the Cyprus Mail is among the most trusted news sites in Cyprus. The newspaper is not affiliated with any political parties and has always striven to maintain its independence. Over the past 70-plus years, the Cyprus Mail, with a small dedicated team, has covered momentous events in Cyprus’ modern history, chronicling the last gasps of British colonial rule, Cyprus’ truncated independence, the coup and Turkish invasion, and the decades of negotiations to stitch the divided island back together, plus a myriad of scandals, murders, and human interests stories that capture the island and its -people. Observers describe it as politically conservative.