Jul
4
2007
The Way of the Arpha (Part III)
E-Mail
Print
The first part of this piece is the May 4 entry and the second part is the June 4 entry.
8. THE LAMP
THE EPICENTER of the training camp was a vast plaza roughly the size of a football pitch where all parades and ceremonies took place. The paved plaza was empty save for two buildings. On the far end, overlooking the Mediterranean, was the training camp headquarters building. And in the middle of the plaza, rising up out of the center of this vast concrete plain, was the church. It was one-fifth the size of the headquarters building and was essentially no more than an altar and sanctum designed for outdoor services, but its focal location sent the clear message that the activities of the training camp were dedicated and beholden to the house of God, who was after all the best general the army had ever known since He was the only superior who commanded the respect of almost all the soldiers. He was so effective at infusing discipline and elevating morale among army ranks that no other officer had ever raised the tender and controversial matter of His beard, although a few officers did secretly nurse the hope that He might one day be reconceived as a clean-shaven Lord, or at least a mustached one. Continue reading
May
4
2007
The Way of the Arpha (Part I)
E-Mail
Print
(see the April 4 posting Three Months in the Life of the Cypriot National Guard for a preface to this piece)
arphas (ärf’äs) 1. a Cypriot male who conscripts in the January “alpha” series of National Guard basic training 2. (derogatory) a jackass (pl. arphades)
1 THE CONSCRIPTION OFFICER
THE CONSCRIPTION OFFICER did not look up from his desk when I entered his office. Nor did he look up when I handed him the copy of my birth certificate proving I was over the age of twenty-six or the consul’s letter from a Cyprus embassy in the U.S. confirming I had spent most of my life outside of Cyprus.
He glanced at the consul’s document. “Why isn’t this in Greek!” he muttered in a voice without a trace of Cypriot dialect. “They want to make us all Amerikanakia!” He slowly and disgustedly shook his head at this diplomatic betrayal of the ethnic struggle. It was deplorable because the National Guard had been trying for close to a half century to make us Cypriots all Greeks. Continue reading
