Many of the world's great cities and international residential hubs are experienced at a high price, both monetarily and metaphorically, both to one's pocket and one's nerves. They are without question great places, but one breathes the selfsame air, and experiences the selfsame chronic pollution, congestion, exposure to crime as everybody else, not to mention a ridiculously expensive price per square meter for real estate which seems to buy less year on year.
Now imagine a destination that offers what might be referred to as a Goldilocks solution: voted as one of the top five global destinations for relocation, voted as having no less than two out of the top five beaches in Europe, voted as having the second best climate globally: a middle class country which comes third on the planet in terms of higher education and skills: a place with symphony orchestras, opera, chamber music, ballet, great independent academies that act as conduits to the best universities in the UK and US, Waldorf and Montessori schools, a flourishing art scene, dynamic universities, a place that excels in software development, robotics, finance and insurance, shipping and aviation. Imagine a place that is a gorgeous Mediterranean island, an exotic garden of a country, where one can actually fit in and flourish: where integration is easy as 75% of the population is either conversational or fluent in English. Imagine a place where the air is fresh, where the infrastructure is superb, which is democratic and free (19th on the global freedom index) and where diversity is such that there are large integrated communities from places as diverse as the UK, Russia, the MENA, China, Sri Lanka and the Philippines. Image a place that is at once alpine (with four ski resorts) and subtropical enough to grow bananas and mangoes.
Especially if one owns a bit of land, the possibilities are endless in terms of vitaculture in a country with a tradition in wine that goes back thousands of years. Then one can grow citrus, olives, peaches, tropical fruit and more. Gardens bloom beautifully in the temperate climate and the soil is so rich that plant growth is exponential.
The cities have beautiful semi-suburban areas and are surrounded with villages, often with plots affording superb sea and mountain views. There is a gentle, sun-kissed effortlessness and ease to life in Cyprus, where things move at a relaxed place.
Out of all this flows a sybaritic lifestyle with an easy commute along empty highways and roads to a local British or international school, to the beach, to an art gallery, concert or lecture, ballet performance, restaurant for a family meal or simply to the mall.
Imagine a place with good connectivity that one can use as a splendid baseof operations, with a beguilingly hybrid lifestyle whereby the Mediterranean art of living merges with a way of life reminiscent of Canada or the US but which also has a distinct British influence. It sounds intriguing because it is. Cyprus is the island that has simply everything. It is morphing with warp speed into a sophisticated, cultured, exciting and dynamic hub with four sophisticated and flourishing cities that justly complement her gorgeous countryside.
