a fairground life( start of easter)

what a day! the dropzone failed to work for the first two hours. the ride registered a fault and would not start up. we finally traced the problem to a broken brush contact under the gondolla. after replacing this the ride worked fine. then the miami ride was not operating at full speed. the pump control has some play on it. i have arranged for a hydraulic specialist to service it tomorrow, but alas the ride was closed all afternoon. the sun was shining and there was a lot of people on the fairground for a couple of hours. after this week hopefully all systems will be go..

a fairground life( water laser decals)

we are all setup for opening tomorrow. hopefully everything will go well , but after the winter closed spell you usually get some small teething problems. "r" and i took the water lasers to Edinburgh today to get the decals applied to them. on the way we were stopped by the wheel tappers for a spot check. they only weighed the van and the water laser trailer. everything was ok and we were on our way in a short time. for all the years i've travelled this is the first time i've been pulled in.
it took six of us to apply the decals as they were so big (3m x 1.5m). there was a slight breeze blowing and i thought that they were going to torn, as we kept pulling them off and then re applying them until they were in the correct position.
we only got half the decals as the printer went on the blink. shame as i was looking forward to seeing the job finished. hopefuly next week..

a fairground life( setting up in glasgow)

we have been three full days setting up in glasgow now. for the dropzone and the skydiver this is the first fair of the year. it always amazes me how something can be working when you pack it away , but not when you bring it out again. the skydiver generator needed a new battery, the dropzone had a burnt out pin one one of the mains plugs. it also needed a bit of thawing out to get it to work properly. these modern rides with all the fancy computer circuitry are very tempramental. any how after half an hour and a couple of ride cycles it seemed to come to life. the water lasers are finished and awaiting decoration. i'm using printed vynal graphics. the art work will be great, i just hope i can stick it on without getting any bubbles or creases in the finish.

a fairground life(Edinburgh -Glasgow)

Saturday night was the last night of the fair near Edinburgh. We closed promptly at 9pm and started to take down the miami. "r" and I had it ready for the road in an hour. I noticed an oil leak under the ride, this will need looked at before we open in Glasgow. It was tight in the small car park we were in and as a result we had to reverse the ride out and jack knife it around a corner. Doing this led to a tyre being popped off its disc. It must have been down or very soft for this to happen. We drove the truck up onto a block on the inside tyre to take the weight off the flat one. Then we put the air line on and blew it up. This all took up an extra hour and it was nearly 11pm by the time we got underway. We arrived in Glasgow just before 1am. With the clocks going forward I've lost another hours sleep aswell. Today we moved the other rides to Glasgow from Stirling, the dropzone and the skydiver. I started to erect the skydiver but the generator would not start. I hope its just the battery flat after sitting for a couple of months. Tomorrow we will try to get them all set up.

a fairground life(Ireland trip)

I left Armagh at 9am on Tue morning. I got to the docks at Larne for 11am and booked passage on the 1:30 pm sailing. On the ferry all freight drivers get a free meal. It was of a very good quality. The vehicles on the ferry were packed in tightly. They were so close to each other , I had to slither down the side of the cab to get out the vehicle.
The ferry docked at Cairnryan just before 3pm. I drove straight to Edinburgh to the next fair and got there for 6:30pm. My son "r" met me there and we started to set the ride up. By 9pm we were heading back to Glasgow. It was a long day. I'll post an article about the whole trip later this week.

a fairground life(Ireland)

Today was spent getting the vehicle ready to go to Ireland. First I washed everything, it had two months of winter grime on it. I hope it stays dry tomorrow or it'll be dirty again by the time i get to the ferry. I've dieseled up the lorry and generator,checked the lights,tyres,water and oil. I alway get the feeling i've forgot something. As for the cyprus adventure, ive posted it to another site in two complete parts-http://www.socyberty.com/People/A-Funfair-Adventure-in-Cyprus.18253 and http://www.socyberty.com/People/Cyprus-Funfair-Adventure-Part-two.18397

more next week

a fairground life

I went and picked the miami ride up today so i can prepair it for the trip to Ireland. Any way heres the next instalment of the cyprus saga...
Pathos April 1999
As the first 10 days of Pathos were the Greek Easter holiday period we were busy every night. I finally got even with the cash I had deposited into Mr “A”s bank account in Feb. Then on the Monday it was like a light going out. I have never seen this before. We were opening and not seeing one person. It was approaching our Easter now, but we had been getting money only from the locals. Now they were working to accommodate the British holiday makers and the Brits weren’t on holiday to come to the fair. This meant we never seen any Brits at all. This is why I thought that staying the summer would be no good and was happy to be going home in three weeks. It was time also for my in laws to go home. They were worried that it would get busy again, but I said there was not much chance and any way we had arranged some foreign help for the games (a Chinese girl) , Hank had hired a Russian girl to look after the lucky numbers game. That next day my in laws returned to the U.K. Business was so bad at Pathos now that the Chinese girl refused to take wages from me! I was only giving her £5 a night! I had to force the money on her. She would stay in the stall at all times, no toilet breaks, no meal breaks, it was embarrassing. The only time she left the game was one night when two policemen happened to walk through the fair. All the new foreign workers disappeared. It became clear that they thought it was immigration officials. These young workers were all students studying here in Cyprus on scholarships and were not allowed to work. If they got caught they would get sent home. After the police left they all resumed their places. The Chinese girl wanted to return to the UK and stay with my wife and I. If British workers had this kind of loyalty today, we might still be an empire.
We had two weeks to go. Money was tight again. “c” was in Europe trying to get a new ride for the proposed permanent park in Limassol. “d” was building a mobile stall (with my help) to stay at the permanent park with. One day we went to get materials to finish the stall. We had several 10ft x 5ft sheets of tin to transport. The only way to get them into the car was to roll them like a tube and put them across the back seat. Halfway back they decided to unroll and nearly decapitated us I had a slow puncture on the front of the lorry. I went to get a new tyre for the vehicle. I found a tyre services just on the edge of the town. I arranged for then to come down and repair the tyre. Later that day the two Cypriots came down to the fair with a van. I should them the lorry and flat tyre. When I opened their van I saw no spare tyre, no tools, no wheel key. I asked them how were they going to change the tyre with no equipment. The Cypriots explained in broken English that they would drive the lorry to their workshop to change the tyre and then bring it back. They also stated that they were looking forward to driving an E.R.F, as there were none on the island. Sorry to burst their bubble , but I needed this lorry to get home and there was no way I was going to let them go joy riding around in it. I drove the lorry to the tyre services and back.

a fairground life

i am going to ireland for the next week with one of the rides. this will interupt the blog until i return, but i hope to have another story to tell and some picts too. i just hope its not a story of disaster!

a fairground life(cyprus adventure ch19b)

Paphos 1999 cont
Eventually “d” found a small engineers to make him a new nylon wheel for the ride, but it would take another day. This delayed his opening again and for that week I was very busy everyday. Eventually “d” went back to Limassol to try and find wheels for the ride from a scrap yard. Luckily they were the same type as old hospital trolleys. He ended up in a scrap yard belonging to an old Cypriot called ‘crazy Michael’. There he found spare wheels to repair his ride.
My father in law and I also went to this scrap yard to source five core cable for the ride. I was going to need some now for when I returned home since I had changed the ride from 110v dc. I went to the yard office in Limassol. As I walked in there were two of the most stunningly beautiful women I had ever seen. They had dark hair, dark eyes and olive skin. They both were made up like models and had figures to suit. Both were in their thirties I would guess. I asked for crazy Michael, by the look on their faces I quickly realised that they did not care for the ‘crazy’ part of his title. It was revealed to me later by George , that Michael was in his eighties and attending hospital in London for a heart condition. Those two beautiful women were his daughters and run the business for him. Apparently, Michael made his fortune while working for the British army in the 50’s. He was in charge of the fuel depot. In those days they were allowed up to 20% loss a day on the fuel through evaporation. You don’t have to be a master mind to work out what that led to! George said that the “English were very stupid” no doubt George associated with Michael during their younger days. The daughters summoned a Cypriot worker to take me and my father in law to the main yard a short car trip away. When we got there, behind the locked gate it was a treasure trove of ex-army surplus and assorted ‘good junk’. There was a mountain of “jerry” cans, engines, alternators, aircraft parts, armoured cars etc etc. After a short search we found what we were looking for. I pulled out the cable into a straight line to inspect it. The Cypriot pulled out a measuring tape. He gave one end to my father in law to hold. As we walk to the other end , my father in law waited and then followed us a bit to make the measurement shorter (we still laugh about it). With the measurement taken, it was time to haggle the price. I could speak no Cypriot and he could speak no English and we eventually reached an agreement by scratching figures into the ground with a stick! (we still laugh about that too). He wanted £160 CY for the cable. It was bought for £120 CY. This was £80 to Michael, £40 for the Cypriot and £40 to me that I saved from original price, plus thirty feet that was not measured. That cable still works fine today.
The dodgem had developed a problem, the transformer had gotten damaged during erecting the ride and it finally packed in. Lucky for “c” my transformer was sitting idle on the ride since I had changed to 3 phase in Limassol. We ran a main from “c”s generator to the centre of my ride and into the transformer. Then we ran the return feed back again to the dodgem ride. It was over 200 ft of main in all, but it worked fine until “c” got his repaired.

A fairground life(cyprus adventure ch19)

April 1999 Paphos
The day we were building up at Paphos was the hottest yet, The chap looking after the Medusa dark show asked me to move it for him onto its plot as he had no transport for it (it had sailed along with “a”s twist ride). Unknown to me the trailer brake had not been applied. When I shunted the unit under the front of the trailer it slid back off the two blocks and the front legs sank into the soft gravel. We could not get them to lift the truck up again. Eventually I asked Eric to lift it with his Hiab. This it just managed to do with all the alarms buzzing! I hastily got the lorry under to couple up.
The fair was setup and ready for operation by mid week, it was the Greek Easter from Friday and our Easter was next Friday. I though double dunt week, great! There were a couple of spaces in the fair due to equipment leaving for home. It was here that the real reason for the basketball game become apparent. Hank had a large cover made for it. Then he removed the baskets and hung the prizes along the back of the stall. It was identical in appearance to the lucky numbers game, this had been his plan all along! The Irishman asked me to make a game for his hoopla he had just acquired from the U.K. That would be another£50 for me on top of the basketball fee (if I ever got paid). He wanted a toss the coin on the square game. This was obviously because he seen how the Cypriots like to gamble and this was as close as you could get without using a roulette wheel. The next couple of days were spent marking out over 800 squares onto a 2 meter diameter table. Then I had to mark each one with a prize value from 20c to £5. It was taking so long that eventually there were six of us using marker pens to write the values. A few days later there was a near riot at the game. Two large Cypriots who had been playing at one spot for over an hour had eventually won. The only problem was that some clown had changed the 75c to £75. The Irishman tried always to avoid payment but the Cypriots had none of it and he eventually paid out. No one knows to this day except the culprit who changed the table markings. After that the Irishman inspected the table everyday.
The first night open at Pathos was Wednesday night. It was a buster for me, the twist ride had gone home and unluckily for “d” the superbob broke down due to a wheel ballrace. My ride went hard at it for three hours , so did the games and pop it ons. This was what we had all been waiting for. This was the first fair to visit here ever. The fair looked well as Mr”A” had decorated the perimeter wall with hundreds of yards of rope light. The site was so large that we used the front half as a car park. This led to a slight problem on the first Friday night. A local Cypriot trade decide to park in our car park and then start to trade his wares. He used hi van as a mobile stall. Mr”A” and the security tried to move him off, but he refused to go. It was only when Eric parked the Hiab lorry next to his van and threatened to lift it out that the Cypriot decided to move off. A number of them did setup market stalls and tables outside the gate of the fair to peddle their goods.

a fairground life(cyprus adventure ch18)

April ,Paphos 1999
It was approaching Easter time at home, “a” had sent the twist back to catch his best fairs and the Dutch lucky number game was going home also. Mr“a” had ideas about staying the summer and setting up a permanent funfair in Limassol on the sea front. Thoughts about this had been circulating since we first arrived in Cyprus, now it was coming to decision time. He and George had secured an empty plot of land next to McDonalds. The location seemed like a dead cert but the terrain was waste ground and would require a lot of work. “c” had started to look in Europe for a ride to bring here for the summer. “d” was taking the superbob home but decided to make a stall to stay the summer with and also leave two round games and the balloon slide all of which his sisters in law was going to look after. As for me , I wasn’t in a position to leave equipment here and for reasons to become clear in the next three weeks would think it was going to be no good anyway.
The site at Paphos was the best we had been on. It was next to the old Keo brewery. It was near the town and had a low wall around it with a lockable double gate. It was a white kind of gravel surface, perfectly flat and made the site look very clean as if on a marble floor. The only problem was it gave us snow blindness and we had to wear sunglasses all the time because of the glare from it. The hotel we were staying in was the Damon. It was fine and had a large swimming pool. We almost lost “w” in this, she was with the other kids in the small pool. She was wearing an inflatable ring around her waist. She dropped her doll in the pool and as she bent down to pick it up she flipped right over and the ring held her head under and her legs in the air. We were all at the pool sunbathing but didn’t see this happen! Luckily one of the other kids of the same age seen her and pulled her upright. What a fright when they told us. After that no rubber ring , only armbands. I still have nightmares now when I think back about it. We will never be as lucky again.
The night I pulled the ride into Paphos was so clear, the stars were bright and this seemed like a different planet not a different country. The air was warm and I could not believe we only had four weeks to go until home. Our original flight tickets were to expire in two weeks, so my father and mother in law were to go home then. My wife and family would change our tickets for an extended period to finish this fair. As “d” and “c” were staying longer for the summer they would put my ride on the boat for me and save me having to stay here longer. But I still had this fair to finish..

A fairground life(cyprus adventure ch17)

End of Strovolos March 1999
The last week of Strovolos was spent getting ready to pack up and shift. The twist ride owned by “a” was going home. “a” sourced some empty 200 ltr barrels and stored them on his ride and filled them with fuel for getting from London to Glasgow.( fuel in Cyprus was only 25c a litre). We all thought this was a great idea and before long we all had barrels packed into the rides. The last day “c” decided to take the roof cover off the dodgems to quicken the pull down time. What a blunder, sunny Cyprus rained that afternoon and the dodgem cars would not go around the track, they just skidded on the floor. Eventually someone remembered an old trick to restore their traction. He got a few fluorescent tubes and broke them on the wet track. Then he ground the glass to shards and spread it around. I don’t know exactly how this works, but it does and after a few minutes the cars were driving around again no problem.
That night when we pulled down. Everyone left the site and drove all the equipment to Limassol. It was about 2am when I got to the hotel. We all parked along the verge. When I got up in the morning and looked out I was mortified to see all our vehicles parked along the sea front. It completely blocked the sea view from the hotel. The management didn’t seem to mind though, probably because we had been guests there for two months and drank and ate in the bar nearly every night. Later that day some rides went to the docks to sail for home and Europe. We moved a few others onto some waste ground beside the old football pitch. A couple of workmen had started to rebuild the wall we had knocked down the month before to make the gate. (new concrete breeze block, you could easily spot the difference).
We had a couple of days before we were moving to the next location so we all arranged a bus trip up to mount Olympus (10,000 ft) and had a day skiing. That was probably the best all round day for everyone there and for all ages.
The next venue was to be Paphos.This was good news. Paphos was virgin territory for the funfair and it would fall with the Greek Orthodox Easter holidays.When the fair first came to Cyprus three years earlier it was not possible to get to Paphos as the roads were not passable with the large rides. Since then the new road had been completed. We all went on visits to scope out this place before taking the equipment. Paphos was beautiful. There were hotels and bars everywhere. This was truly the tourist hotspot. The new roads were through mountain tunnels and some of the hills were incredibly steep. The road was not completely finished, but it was passable with care. We all agreed on an evening trip as this would be cooler for the vehicles engines , the tyres and the road would be quieter.

A fairground life(cyprus adventure ch16)

Nicosia march 1999
I had been running back and forward to Strovolos twice daily while making the basketball game. The hire car couldn’t take it and eventually the engine seized up. Luckily my father in law had decided a few days earlier that the car wasn’t safe enough for us to do the commuting to the fair in anyway and had hired a Pajero Jeep from Hertz. He said it was for his grand daughters safety. So we used that until George got me another car. I just did what all Cypriots did and left the seized one on the side of the road where it had stopped, George sent someone out to recover it. We had gotten so used to petrol cars that one day my father in law went to fuel the jeep and put petrol in that too. After about 1 mile it stopped then he remembered it was diesel. He found a small garage and had to get the tank drained. He got well ridiculed for that. And it cost him the repair fee.
For the next couple of weeks we had good business at this Strovolos and a couple of nights had been busy like the first night. One time the crowds were so deep at the pop it ons game that my father in law sat on the seat and refused to serve anyone because they were getting too rowdy. We decided to put my mother in law in to watch the game instead. That turned out worse! She clipped a cheeky lad under the chin and he fell back on his rear. Luckily all his pals laughed at him, he was so embarrassed that he got up and left. She got no more cheek after that! The security on the fair were not really that good. “a” on the twist lost a music speaker one night. The security told him he only had three to start with! What was even funnier was you could see the dust print from the missing speaker on the floor. Somehow later the next day it was returned. Mr”a” was getting worried about the refugees stealing money from his tokens boxes. He placed a spotlight on top of each box, wired to a switch so the cashier could flash the light for attention if there was a problem. Mr”a” informed the security of the new procedure. He decided to test it. Watch this he said, when I flash this light they will all come running. He flashed the light for over a minute. We could see the security, but not one came. Mr”a” stormed off in a fit, we all fell about laughing.
I had finished the manufacturing of the basketball game. All I had to do was get paid. The next couple of days were spent making the regulation hoops a bit smaller, so that the Irishman could put bigger prizes on. He was a character and for some reason the local youths gave him a hard time. They would go on the trampolines and jump from bed to bed and not come off when their time was up. The Irishman would go on and chase them to try and get them off, then , when he was exhausted he would go and get the security. One day when he arrived to open, the kids had undone all the springs. The first customer fell through the canvas. Funny now, but not at the time. So much for the 24hr security. “L”s wife also had problems at the dart game. After a week of torture from the youths she stabbed one in the hand with the darts while he was trying to steal the prizes from the game stall! Eventually “L” put chicken wire around the prizes to protect them. This made the stall look like Stalag 13, but it stopped the thieving. When it came to the end of the three weeks, mr”a” added on another week onto Strovolos. We did get some money but the commuting was becoming too much (over 4000 miles in a month), good job the fuel in Cyprus was so cheap. At this time the war in Yeugoslavia was at its height. There was a strong objection here to the Allies bombings and the protestors were out on the streets in force. For the first time I felt threatened, we removed all the European & American flags around the fair and from then on we only flew the Greek & Cypriot flags. This was originally to be the end of our tour, but mr”a” pulled a new venue out of the hat.
more tomorrow.....

a fairground life(cyprus adventure ch15)

Nicosia march 1999
As business wasn’t as good as many had wanted, a couple of the Dutch games were leaving to return to Europe for the summer and do their fairs there. This was going to leave a couple of holes in the fair, so the Irishman (in partnership) with Hank asked me to build a basketball game. Hank had been minding the lucky numbers game (make 21 with lucky dip numbers) this had been taking fortunes compared to the rest of us. Since the games returning to Holland would need their transport this left Hank and the Irishman with no way to transport the trampolines to Strovolos in Nicosia. They went around looking for a private lorry driver to do it for them. The day we left for Nicosia I was driving along the motorway and passed a TIPPER lorry full of TRAMPOLINES!!!. It looked like a load of scrap! When it arrived at the fair site they unloaded it- no sorry, they didn’t unload it- you guessed it THEY TIPPED IT OUT like you would a load of sand! I though to myself it must be scrap now. I had visions of all the irons being bent and twisted.
We were next to a crossroads in an industrial area outside Nicosia. The place was called Strovolos and we were told it was full of refugees from Famagusta and Russia.
There was a small house behind the fairground and a crop field across the road. Mr”a” decided to let Eric build up the typhoon first as it took him two full days to do so. We would get set tomorrow. That evening the Cypriot who lived in the house returned home to see the fair positioned behind his garden. That was that-he complained to the local mayor to have us moved away. Mr”a” and George tried to reach an agreement with him, but to no avail. It seems the world is the same all over- “everybody loves the funfair, but not next to my house!” Now we had nowhere to go. For the next three days mr”a” and George looked for an alternative site. They ended up with the crop field across the road from the original site as a last resort. To get it mr”a” had bought the crop, paid the farmer to clear the field of it and then had to buy the roots because our heavy vehicles would damage them. The field looked very soft and soily. The dust was unbelievable. The lorries were sinking into the soft soil and on top of that we were warned to watch out for poisonous snakes! Poor Eric had to pull the typhoon down again and move it across the road, the Irishman and Hank had to carry the trampolines one piece at a time across the busy road into the field. At nights we were leaving the fair unattended, so the security were put on 24hrs now to stop any thieving. Since it was 56miles everyday to commute, the first night open my mother in law stayed in the room with our daughter“w” at Limassol. That night we opened and at 8pm the fair was mobbed and it turnred out that we were short staffed.
We were finally earning good money. Just before 10pm mr”a” came around and said we would have to close as the crowds were fighting at the gate of the fair! Apparently there had been a football game on (Famagusta v Nicosia, this is were the crowds had came from) and the rival fans were fighting among themselves. We went to the gate to see the situation. There were several hundred people they’re watching around fifty, fighting each other. Just at that a police car pulled up with its sirens blowing. A lone policeman got out the car. We all thought to ourselves- if he tries to stop this he’ll get killed. At that he pulled out his gun and fired two shots in the air. The crowd immediately dispersed and all our customers. The policeman got back in his car and drove away. The whole fair was closed within five minutes.

A fairground life(cyprus adventure ch14b)

Part b
It was nearing the end of our time in Limassol, business was just good enough to justify us being there. The other rides were doing much better trade than I was.The ‘pop it on’ game was doing better than the disc on the plate game for us. “d” had done me a big favour lending me the game. Its best days earnings was here on a day when we had our first winner for tree weeks (only 1 winner at Larnaca). A young lad won, when in a fit of frustration he threw the ring and it hit the back of the stall, re-bounded straight onto a ring and won £10. There was a small crowd watching when he done this and instantly they all wanted a go and all tried the same trick. I thought I was going to lose all the prize money, but no one else won that day. Don’t get me wrong- I like it when someone wins, it stops the “it a con!” comments and is good for custom.
It was our last week in Limassol (so I thought) and we spent a few days in Nicosia looking for our next hotel, but there was only one and it was very expensive (£50) night. Thgis was the hotel everyone had stayed in 3 years before on the first trip to Cyprus. Then it was being redecorated on one wing. This wing was closed to the tourists, but the showmen struck a deal with the hotel manager to let the rooms on one side of the wing at a reduced rate. No such luck this time. We thought we would all split up and rent private apartments around the city. This was concerning on a security issue as we had to leave everything in these apartments while we were out. Some of these were in less than appealing conditon or areas of the city. We were having good nights in the hotel in Limassol and eventually decided to stay here and commute (56miles)to Stravalos near Nicosia every day for a month to the fair.
The weekend that we pulled down in Limassol the Irishman had been asking if anyone could build him a stall. As I was handy with the power tools, he was pointed in my direction. He wanted a basket ball game stall constructed of box iron so it was easy and quick to erect. Much along the lines of a market stall, just a bigger scale. Luckily I had brought my chopsaw and welder with me, I was short of cash so asked him to provide all the materials and I would do the work for £200cy. I started the day after we pulled the rides down and were waiting to go to Nicosia.

a fairground life(cyprus adventure ch14a)

Limassol Feb 1999 opening
We opened on a mid week day, the weather was better, but this made the dust fly more easily from the pitch. I didn’t notice it before but the old front entrance was not square to the pitch, this slight angle made the public walk one way around the fair. This meant that all my equipment was last in line. After the first weekend I asked the Irishman to move the front of the trampolines to the opposite side to be across from my ride. This was so the parents standing there would make it look like something was happening at that end of the fair.This he did for me and it did help. All the time in Cyprus I never saw anyone blind drunk or abusive, all the people were well dressed in either trousers , cords or dark jeans with leather shoes, boots or sandals. The women were stunningly beautiful with their olive skins and slim figures, some of them wore evening dresses to the fair. For three months I never saw a football top, tracksuit, shell suit, Burberry cap, training shoes, bottle of buckfast being drank by a gang of youths or saw an obese person. I said to my wife “this is the land of the beautiful people.” The nearest we had to a problem was one night some kids had been put out the fair by the security ( Georges son in laws business) and they threw halved limes over the wall onto our ride. I’ve been stoned before but that’s the only time I’ve been Limed! The next Tuesday night when we were open I spotted smoke from the middle of the ride. The 110v DC motor was burning out! I switched it off immediately. I think the power from the transformer was too good for it. Well I didn’t have to repair my generator at home, as I would change to three phase now.
The next day I looked all around Limassol for an electrical contractor and found one up a side street. In broken English we established that I needed a 25-30 kw 1500 rpm 415v motor. He offered me a new Russian one for £330 cy or a second hand English Electric (that he had laying in his garden wrapped in a tarp) for £250cy. I went for the English electric, not for the price, but because I thought it would be built to a standard better than the Russian motor. The electrician promised to fit new ballraces and provide a new custom built control box starter with the motor all for £1000 cy. That was a lot cheaper than the same kit in the UK. Only problem was it would take three days to complete. The Cypriot was very friendly, taking me into his house to meet his family and give me coffee(it was real coffee like tar and you had to drink water with it, yuckkkk). For the next few days I only had the ‘popit ons’ open and the disc on a plate game. When the electrician came he only delivered the motor with a vague diagram. He wanted another £100 cy to install it, so I decided to do it myself. Eric came over at that point and started to help me. He was well versed with knowledge of wiring 3ph motors and had all the electrician type tools. In under a couple of hours it was all installed and working. It was lucky that I choose the English motor as this meant the drive coupling to the two hydraulic pumps fitted perfectly. I started the ride and timed the cycle. The ride was revolving too fast as the old motor was only 1200 rpm. I decided to reverse the two hydraulic pumps as I knew one was 25% more volume than the other. When I retimed the ride it was bang on speed, all I had done was increased the lift rate of the ride by 10 seconds. This was fine because I felt it was always too slow anyway- DOUBLE BONUS-thing were looking up. That system is still working fine today, but the alleged new ballraces failed 18months later back in the UK, Oh Well!
part b tomorrow.

a fairground life(cyprus adventure ch13)

Limassol Feb. 1999
We were to open the fair in the old closed football pitch on the front. The pitch was the oldest in Cyprus and was surrounded by a 12-foot high wall. The front gates were to small to bring the loads in through. Only big enough for a small car at best. Anyhow these gates had not been opened for many many years and they were boarded up at the front. We would have to open them, but that would be another days problem. The pitch was of a white blaze. Strangely there was an old grave not far from the end of my ride, against the wall. The head stone was too far detereorated to make out any dates or titles. The hotel (something Beach) we were staying in was right next to the football ground and the hotel bar looked directly into the ground. We had a room on the next floor up right above the pool table room. Every night I could here the balls go down as loud as if my head was inside the pooltable. It must have been something to do with the re-bar in the concrete and the pooltable sitting on a marble floor. This was more like a hotel, it also had other guests as well as us. Since the season was moving on and the location was more tourist like, the rooms were more expensive (£18) a night. I arrived at Limassol about 4pm, since we couldn’t get into the football ground until tomorrow I parked on a quiet road opposite a building site. I got into the car we had hired from George(a few days before) and drove to the hotel. It was hectic getting booked in as we all arrived about the same time. When we got the car emptied of the luggage, I went back to the ride and got off it the cases that we had packed in there, as they wouldn’t all fit in the car.
The next day we all went down to the pitch to set the fair. Only one problem-there was no gate for the rides to enter the pitch-it was a solid wall 12 feet high! Mr”a” said don’t worry I’ve sent for a JCB, we’ll make a gate at the rear. Now bear this in mind-this is the oldest football stadium on the island, it’s a sort of landmark, probably a listed building.
That evening just before dark a JCB did arrive at the rear of the stadium and DID knock a 20 ft gap in the wall for a gate! That’s how we got the rides onto the pitch. All the attractions were; medusa dark show-German, trampolines-Irish, rolla ball game & lucky numbers- Dutch, typhoon ride-Austrian, dart game & juvenile & action ride – English, superbob, twist, dodgem, tempest, soccer game, t-cups, snack bar x 2, pop it ons, balloon slide, 5 round stalls- Scottish. We set the rides up over the next couple of days. One day a heard a bit of a commotion at the rear of the ground. I went to see what it was. There was a Cypriot man yelling irately at Mr”a” and George. I don’t speak Greek, but I knew exactly what he was saying when he was yelling and pointing to the hole in the wall. Eventually they got him calmed down. Later that night Mr”a” told us that he had permission from the club chairman to open the wall and that chap was the club secretary and hadn’t been informed. He said it was all resolved and A ok. I don’t know the truth of the matter, but we did stay for another three weeks open. To close the new gate at night we drove “L”s Foden lorry across the gap. Around the pitch were spotlight towers. At the top each had a single floodlight. They were all facing the wrong way to light up the fair so mr”a” asked everyone to climb up the tower nearest to them and adjust it accordingly. This seemed easy enough as there was a ladder on each tower, all you had to do was climb onto the 12ft wall with your ladder and then onto the tower ladder. This I did no problem, but by the time I got 3/4 up the tower(25ft) it had started to sway with my weight. The steel was red rusty and I had visions of it folding up at any moment. I did get the light adjusted, but that was the only one, I was too scared to do any others.

a fairground life(cyprus adventure ch12)

Jan 1999 Larnaca cont.
My wife and “d”s wife decided that our kids needed to get some schooling. So they went to the British Army base a Dhekelia. There they met a teacher who ran the small school for the soldiers families. They were sympathetic, but couldn’t enrol our children, but a teacher could give private lessons from home. That’s what we did , my son and “d”s two sons went to private lessons for one hour 2-3 days a week at a cost of £10 each. They all came on leaps and bounds. There is a city in Cyprus called Famagusta. It is deserted now in no mans land between the Turkish occupied side of Cyprus and the Greek Cypriot side. The island is divided into two and there is a wall through the capital Nicosia. The Turks invaded the island in the 70s onto Famagusta beaches and people fled their homes. Families were separated and people where never seen again. Some Cypriots near the city have opened tourist spots with long range telescopes to view the city. I could see a white UN peace keepers patrol car when we looked through the scope. Rumour has it that shops , banks and homes are the way they were when the people left with all the contents still inside!!!.
A local business man came from Ayia Napa to visit the fair. He had a bungee tower and a big wheel at a small park in Ayai Napa. I think he came to check out the opposition. Anyway he told us he got the equipment from two Russian partners(Cyprus rely ’s heavily on Russian imports-steel , vehicles, prostitutes , tourists, electrics etc) when it was time to pay them he set them up. He arranged to meet them in a club. Then he hired a couple of heavies to pick a fight with them. This led to them being deported without payment of course. Then he asked us if we wanted to supply some equipment! Needless to say there was no interest. I don’t know if this local business man had anything to do with it,but a couple of days later Mr”a” came and told we all had to register for work permits.(Only heads of families) so all the men went to a Doctors surgery in the town of Lanarca for a chest x-ray and aids test at a cost of £100 cy. Then to a government building to register and pay £300 cy deposit against me getting into trouble and being deported! I got a small green booklet in return. The next day Mr”a” came and said that all the money we declared coming into the country had to be lodged into a bank account. Apparently you have two weeks grace on the cash then it has to be banked. The only person with a bank account in Cyprus was mr”a”. So of my father in law went with him to deposit the cash, along with everyone else’s. My father in law told mr”a” in no unclear words that if this money went astray there would be consequences! After that when I did my split with the tokens I worked it off against what I deposited. Only thing was at this rate of earnings it was going to take a while. The bin game looked good, but the bins couldn’t take the mechanical strain of the open close motion and began to brake up. We needed a fast , cheap alternative-in our apartment we had white pyrex dishes. We placed these on a cup and tried the disc on a plate game. We used ride tokens from our ride as a test and they seemed to bounce just right. Not too much to make it impossible, but not too little to make it easy. The next day I got some assorted plant pots and set the plates on them. That night they opened and the game seemed to be ok. We couldn’t give too many prizes away as we had to travel to Limassol to the only cash n carry who stocked soft toys. The prizes were of a good size and cheaper than the UK. This was probably due to them being copyright rip offs from Taiwan and having no CE quality mark. However they were well made and looked very good. The Cypriots never had any complaints about them and the toys ranged from 3inches tall to three feet tall! Eventually our stint at Lanarca was at an end. We pulled down the rides on Sunday night. At about 1am I finished and switched off the generator. As I walked across the road I could here loud laughing. Down at the local tavern all our women were sitting at tables on the pavement drinking. My wife had started on the local Keo Rum. My daughter was asleep in her pushchair, so I took her with me back to the room. I don’t know what time my wife came in, but the Keo Rum had really knocked her for six. The next day she couldn’t get her head off the pillow and was in a bad way. I thought I was going to have to pack the cases myself ,but luckily Mr”a” said we weren’t moving to Limassol that day, it would be the next. I don’t know who was more relieved -my wife or myself.