crossing the border

I’m heading over across the border again today, this time to meet one of our philosophy blogger friends. Here’s what the border crossing is like when coming from the southern part of Nicosia/Lefkosia, where I’m staying…

Ledra Street, which is the main artery of the shopping district in the southern part of the city, leads straight into a checkpoint. All of the governmental facilities on both sides of the line are sort of like trailers, or like ticket windows for a theater or circus.

To your right is a Republic of Cyprus facility, but that’s only for when you’re coming back in. They don’t want to see your passport on the way out.

Then you’re in the zone for about 20 or 30 feet, and if you look left and right you can see plenty of damaged/abandoned buildings along the Green Line. The big conflict was in 1974, and I would assume that none of these buildings have been used for anything in 36 years.

Then, on your left, a Northern Cyprus trailer, white and with the image of their flag painted on it. You have to fill out a white visa form. They can’t stamp your passport because there are recognition controversies about the national status of Northern Cyprus. So instead, they stamp the piece of paper.

The northern side of Nicosia is rather different from the southern part. On the North it’s a lot like Turkey, unsurprisingly; the style of the mosques is the same, of course.

It’s also pretty easy to get lost in the northern part, though just like in Damascus you’ll eventually hit one of the old walls and be able to reorient yourself that way. But a couple of times, the twisty streets had me turned around so that I was shocked to come upon buildings that I thought were many blocks behind me. It had a sort of urban “Blair Witch Project” feel to it.

Neither the northern nor the southern part of the old city is especially large, but you can easily spend several hours wandering around the northern part.

When leaving, the Northern Cyprus authorities do ask to see your passport and visa. In most cases they type your passport number into a computer. They let you keep the visa, which is reusable for periods of, I believe, up to 3 months. They do stamp the visa upon exit, though, which would make me somewhat self-conscious about going in multiple times per day; as a result, I’ve only made one trip per day to the North.

The Republic of Cyprus trailer then appears 20 or 30 feet later, and they also want to see your passport and visa before allowing you back in. To my surprise, they didn’t check my rather large bag the first time. I had read that they are very strict about cigarette smuggling and so would examine any tourist bags carefully. That didn’t happen.

Since 2003 this has all been a lot less tense, apparently. My understanding (and this is just what I’ve heard) is that the only people who have problems crossing are the Turkish immigrants in the North who want to cross into the South. The original Turkish Cypriots reportedly have no problem.

I’ve wondered a bit if Nicosia was the inspiration for China Miéville’s much weirder divided place in The City and the City.