Working the land is a chance, one indignant lifelong farmer tells THEO PANAYIDES, and credit praying to St Parthenios for curing his most cancers
Tractors parked in single file, blocking the street so far as the attention can see. It’s February 8 and farmers have descended on Nicosia from throughout Cyprus, parked exterior European Union Home and going through – in order that they declare – an ideal storm of issues (most of them attributable to the EU’s inexperienced agenda) that threatens to destroy the entire farming sector.
A union rep offers me a fast rundown. A lot of the previous pesticides have been banned for environmental causes, and the brand new accredited replacements are insufficient. (A farmer reveals a photograph of his orchard, the bottom strewn with fallen oranges.) The EU is getting ready to import cheaper, unregulated items from Latin America. EU-wide coverage is rigid, thus as an example a rule about not being allowed to spray inside 150 metres of a river or stream is okay for greater international locations with massive tracts of land, however impractical for Cyprus. Brexit has modified the UK market, making our exports uncompetitive. The conflict in Ukraine has flooded the market with low-cost wheat. And so forth.
Andreas Theophanous stands slightly manner away, speaking to a different farmer. The rep factors him out once I ask for somebody who is likely to be prepared to speak about his life – not as a result of he is aware of Andreas personally, however as a result of it’s clear that he loves to speak. He’s a hanging determine, along with his snow-white hair and Santa Claus beard (the beard an indication of mourning for his brother, who handed away 4 months in the past), and hails from Troulloi, a buffer-zone village up the street from Oroklini. He’s been a farmer – renting land, and rising grain on it – for 46 years, for the reason that age of 20.
Really, he was near the land (“a helot of the land,” as he places it) even earlier, when he and his brother would care for their dad’s flock of sheep; Andreas’ father pulled him out of faculty on the age of 12, to assist on the farm. He by no means had a Plan B other than farming, no specific expertise he longed to pursue – however he absolutely would possibly’ve made a great lawyer, in one other time and place. Andreas has at all times been an organiser (he fashioned the primary affiliation of grain producers, again within the day) and at all times one to face up for his rights.
“I hear God telling me, ‘Re Andrea, yell!’,” he says. (Any translation into English is sure to be a watered-down model of his vibrant Cypriot.) “That’s why I’m at all times shouting at people who we have now to claim ourselves – we have now to yell. We will’t be fatalistic.”
God watches over his life in one other manner too. The day earlier than the protest – February 7 – is the identify day of St Parthenios, an obscure Third-century saint whose obscurity is considerably undeserved since he’s, in any case, the patron saint of most cancers sufferers. Andreas solely heard about this saint on February 6, 1998. It was a coincidence (he occurred to listen to about it on the radio), however a lucky one – as a result of two days earlier, the then 41-year-old father of 5 had been advised he had most cancers. The illness had begun in his colon, then unfold; by the point the docs discovered it, he was riddled with it.
What occurred subsequent might strike outsiders as doubtful – however Andreas himself is bound of it. Certainly, he says, the rationale he agreed to speak to me was as a lot to unfold the phrase about St Parthenios as to lament the issues within the farming sector. He prayed to the saint, he recollects, and the saint “carried out a miracle within the hospital. He cured me. He resurrected me”.
What did the docs say?
“The docs, 25 years in the past once I was filled with most cancers they usually threw up their palms, once I did an ultrasound 5 months later they usually noticed I used to be clear, they couldn’t consider it.” Andreas nods sagely: “I believed it. And I nonetheless consider”.
As so typically with such issues, laying out the main points is an invite to choose holes within the story. Nonetheless, right here goes: the docs opened him up, did what they may (not a lot), then put him on oxygen in a hospital mattress, extra lifeless than alive. At one level, the oxygen tank malfunctioned; an alarm bell rang, and a nurse reached him within the nick of time. It was simply as properly you rang that bell, the nurse advised him later; just a few seconds later and also you’d have suffocated – however Andreas identified that he’d barely been aware, and definitely in no place to ring a bell. He then began chemo, extra in hope than expectation of enchancment – but just a few months later, as he says, the most cancers was gone.
One factor, a minimum of, is simple: the cave within the hills round Troulloi, which Andreas has reworked right into a shrine to St Parthenios. There’s additionally an even bigger church now – however the cave got here first, “and lots of people come who’re affected by most cancers. We had a wake there the opposite day, [on his name day], we had 170 chairs and the place was filled with victims coming to hunt the saint’s assist, and his grace.
“When you might have most cancers,” he opines, “for those who don’t look to God, or a saint – all saints carry out miracles – no-one might help you. Earlier than you even die, you’ll go loopy from the thought that you just’re dying!” St Parthenios cured him, he believes, “so I would like you to jot down that in Troulloi there’s a church of St Parthenios, patron saint of most cancers sufferers, and a cave too… And he helps lots of people – so anybody who needs to, give them my telephone quantity and have them name me. They will come up, and I’ll take them there.”
We’re interrupted by a normal hubbub, then a deafening honking of tractor horns. Phrase has arrived from the presidential palace that the farmers’ calls for have been met (or a minimum of guarantees have been made, shrugs Andreas cynically), so the protest is over, a minimum of for now. They’ll be again, he reckons because the tractors trundle off. The issues are too massive, the sector too beleaguered to be solved so simply – and certainly, although a ‘golden age’ did exist in Cyprus within the 80s, farming normally is a tough enterprise (even with out the EU), at all times a hair’s-breadth away from catastrophe.
“Sadly, a farmer is sort of a gambler,” muses Andreas. “We plant in October or November – and also you simply don’t know. It could possibly be going properly, then due to a storm you lose the entire yr. It’s a chance, our job. It’s not what you’d name a gradual job.”
It’s little surprise that farmers flip to faith – and certainly, he doesn’t simply pray to ‘his’ saint for well being issues, however skilled issues too. Each morning he’ll go to the cave, the shrine, the place a candle burns all day lengthy. “I’ll take oil from the candle and cross myself, I’ll mild his candle, get some charcoal and do a blessing, I’ll pray for his assist, then go away.” Final yr was a drought yr, says Andreas – and the difficulty with a drought yr is that it impacts the next yr too, because you don’t have cash to purchase seeds for planting.
Final Could he was starting to get determined, questioning what to do – so he went to the cave and prayed. “Please assist me so I can plant once more,” he requested St Parthenios. “I’ve complete religion in you, that you are able to do it”. Then he left, he recollects, “I calmed down and it didn’t hassle me anymore. I knew he’d care for it. And he despatched me two guys. I advised them I’d give them a cheque on the finish of the yr – they usually introduced me seeds and fertiliser, and I planted”. He doesn’t specify who the blokes in query have been; the purpose is that they arrived unexpectedly – as if despatched by windfall – and saved the day.
Within the previous days, in fact, all these mystical contortions would’ve been pointless – as a result of they’d the Co-op. In a drought yr, Andreas would go to the Co-op (they knew him properly, in any case his years within the enterprise) and borrow cash, which he’d then repay the following yr. There’s an equal now, a state compensation scheme, nevertheless it takes too lengthy (therefore, partly, immediately’s protest) – an inefficient end result that makes him indignant, simply because the demise of the Co-op makes him indignant. “Illiterate individuals [i.e. farmers] constructed it, then the educated individuals destroyed it,” he fumes. “So they may steal.”
Numerous issues make Andreas Theophanous indignant. It’s simple to overlook, since he’s so boisterous and convivial – however he additionally fashioned the primary grain-producer affiliation, as already talked about (unaffiliated to any occasion), and led a prolonged 18-day protest within the days of Tassos Papadopoulos. “We took the tractors, even the combines, and we took them to Nisou and stayed there for 18 days… I used to be sleeping within the pickup truck within the chilly. And we lastly managed to persuade Papadopoulos”. It was proper after we’d joined the EU, he recollects, “they usually hadn’t advised us how one can fill within the varieties correctly” – so the farmers stayed on the street until the federal government agreed to a yr’s grace interval, scrapping the fines which they’d already issued; Andreas truly walked (it’s unclear why) all the way in which from Nisou to Parliament to make his case. God did instruct him to yell, in any case.
Extra lately he yelled when he and different villagers cultivated some barren hilly land round Troulloi, on their very own initiative – just for the federal government, which owns the land, to demand lease. “If we have been in Israel, they’d construct a statue to us!” he protested to the agriculture minister. (The minister backed down.) “And why? To allow them to steal much more,” he provides indignantly. Andreas takes a dim view of the federal government normally – “I’ll inform you one factor. The final individuals who’ll go hungry in Cyprus are the civil servants” – which hasn’t stopped him from urging his youngsters to get authorities jobs. 4 of the 5 are certainly within the public sector, one daughter being a cop whereas one other is an academic psychologist and one other a nurse – the youngest one impressed by her childhood, when her dad had most cancers and was cared for by nurses (and St Parthenios).
One factor makes him angriest of all, nonetheless: the truth that he nonetheless, at 66, has to farm the land, as a result of his pension is so meagre (€500, minus a 12 per cent penalty for beginning to declare at 63). He’s begged three former presidents through the years, “I advised them, ‘Arrange a pension for the farmers. I’m not saying it is best to give them €3,000, like civil servants get – however €1,000, €1,500, to allow them to dwell with dignity’.” His dad nonetheless needed to work into his 70s, even again within the golden age – and now it’s occurring to him too.
It’s not that he hates being near the land, not after 46 years – nevertheless it’s onerous work: “We is likely to be up all evening, once we’re tying the hay… I’ve had occasions once I didn’t sleep for 2 days and nights, and was bumping my head towards the tractor”. Farming is difficult, it’s dangerous, it’s unpredictable. You surprise why anybody would select to do it – even earlier than the present storm of wars and rules made it well-nigh not possible. “There received’t be a farmer left,” he predicts grimly – which might be a disgrace, and never only for apparent causes.
Andreas Theophanous in all probability wouldn’t thrive within the EU. His opinions aren’t precisely politically appropriate, even past being unfashionably non secular. He complains concerning the Natura websites round Troulloi (it’s like birds are extra vital than individuals, he scoffs), and blames girls’s rights, a minimum of partly, for top divorce charges. ‘Was Cyprus higher previously?’ I ask – and he nods vigorously.
“A lot better. A lot better! And I’ll inform you why… As a result of there was nonetheless anthropia,” he says, utilizing the Greek phrase that interprets as ‘decency’ or ‘humanity’.
Which means what? Considering of others?
“Precisely! I’m human firstly, I’ve emotions. I don’t care about cash, might it rot and burn.” Individuals used to assist one another, he affirms, “a housewife would bake bread and take the primary loaf to her neighbour” – whereas now they don’t, cash guidelines the roost. “You’re solely going to search out anthropia in some villages,” says Andreas – “and amongst farmers… We’re nonetheless nearly holding on to it, making an attempt to go it on to our youngsters and grandchildren.
“And that’s what I’m yelling about. ‘When farming goes,’ I at all times say, ‘Cyprus shall be misplaced, and decency too’.” He stands on the pavement – the tractors now gone – like a person from one other time and one other tradition, then trudges to his automobile for the journey again to Troulloi.
