The village of Kalopanayiotis is my father’s village. You might render it with some fancy as “Mario the Fair”. It perches precariously on the green mount Troodos. It was as hardscrabble a village as any in the area, but its sulphur springs guaranteed a stream of visitors from the towns.
Which is the most plausible reason I can find that this is the one part of Cyprus where the phonetic change x > θ has been blocked (or properly, reversed).
Like many small villages both here and in Greece, it is slowly dying out, and is being salvaged by turning into a destination for foreigners. Much of the village is being bought up piecemeal by the former mayor, and converted into part of his hotel setup.
It makes the village patchwork, with golf carts shooting past ruins, but it was the only way Kalopanayiotis was going to stay a going concern.
And Kalopanayiotis has been a destination for out of towners since they worked out there was sulphur in the springs. It’s not that new a thing here.
Much of the village of Kalopanayiotis is accessible by road with some patience, but it truly is perched on a steep hill, with old narrow streets and ongoing construction, and the drive-in was a rapidfire alternation of reminiscences and fury at poor traffic indicators.
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