The Luxury Ghost Town....

No... it's not one of the newly overbuilt towns in China, nor anything that cannot be lived in near Chernobyl.

I had never heard of Varosha.... but from the accounts of all those who lived there in this Mediterranean paradise where Elizabeth Taylor and Brigit Bardot once leisurely frequented, along with all the rich of Europe... Varosha is still there and still intact.... an oceanfront city of 45,000, the rich seaside suburb of medieval Famagusta Cyprus.

Since the 1974 Turksih invasion and takeover of the NE 1/3 of Cyprus, the city of Famagusta is an open and busy city in the Turckish Eastern part of Cyprus. But the Greek owned waterside suburb of Varosha, has been fenced off with barbed wire for 40 years.... leaving the town exactly as it was in 1974, albeit the Turks have long since looted all the buildings.

So today this closed off "bargaining chip" in settling "the Cyprus problem"... is uninhabited... even though all the former residents want to come back, repossess their property, and continue again.

It really is like something out of a Twilight Zone episode... yes... all those tall beachfront hotels have been empty for 38 years....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fTZMSpgRAsI

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xiFg4Og6JcU


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Varosha,_Famagusta

Map:
http://wikitravel.org/en/File:Greek_...egions_map.png

This really is surreal.... :eek:

On a totally different, and much vaster scale are the empty "New Ghost Cities" of China... empty cities, empty roads, empty shopping malls, and 64 million empty apartments... all built with a "if you build it they will come" mentality....

China's incredible ghost cities...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GpnoPhY1f70

Unbelievable, and on a scale unimaginable.... :eek:

I've seen those, but never understood why they would do that. You'd think that with all the people that are homeless in that country, they'd house some of them in the empty homes if for nothing else, propaganda purposes.

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Originally Posted by old guy

I've seen those, but never understood why they would do that. You'd think that with all the people that are homeless in that country, they'd house some of them in the empty homes if for nothing else, propaganda purposes.

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Unless, of course, the towns were built for future use by those within "The Party", so letting the lessers, the Plebians, occupy 'em might be considered defilement.

We've got to consider the extreme classism of their culture, we're still talking in terms of supply and demand here.

Cheers!

And as for the Cypriot dilemma, I almost took on an international client for a high-end hifi consultation and installation back when my custom business was really clicking, before the turn of the century. Learned a ton about Cyprus and ultimately decided that the expense and effort would not be worth taking my little company to that level. Plus, it kinda freaked me to be on the old battle-lines of those damnable Crusades.

It was fun to explore the possibilities, and learn about a new area and culture...but Mr. Audi ultimately had to find another hifi guy.

Cheers

I often wonder whether other animals, amongst themselves, refer to Homo sapiens as "that insane species."

Here's one in Canada: 16x9 - Ghost Town: Canadian community abandoned 30 years ago

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16:9 takes you to a real-life ghost town - Kitsault, BC. Find out why this entire Canadian community was abandoned more than 30 years ago. Carolyn Jarvis reports.

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• Kitsault.com

Fascinating. Molybdenum might be back, and LNG natural gas hub is brewing.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/repor...board/follows/