Documents and evidence from the inspection that took place every year inside the Golden Sands Beach Hotel, which is closed to the British interests.
The looting that has always taken place in the enclosed Famagusta has been huge, sweeping and ruthless, but there is a large, seaside hotel that It was NOT looted like the other buildings and whose pre-war furniture is kept - probably to this day - almost untouched.
According to an interview with Avant Garde by Robin Plummer, an Englishman who researched Britain's national archives in London, the Golden Sands Beach Hotel, which is located on the then John Kennedy Avenue and is the first of the large seaside hotels seen from Deryneia is a very special case of a building within the enclosure.
Due to the fact that it was of English interests and belonged to a British Group of companies, the Golden Sands - which by the way is an amazing example of Cypriot Modernism - was not looted like the other buildings, hotels, houses and houses in the city - Ghost of Famagusta clear how There was a strict instruction, both during the Turkish invasion and in the years that followed, that the hotel should not be violated and that its interiors should remain as they were.
Once a year, in fact, until the mid or late 1980s, it was inspected by a representative of the British company, who with a special permit obtained by the Turkish army entered the enclosure and visited the hotel to find out who it was. his internal situation and whether or not there had been vandalism and theft.
Photo from the visit of Turkish journalists in 2019
Mr. Plummer's words are confirmed by the pages of The Cyprus Tapes by David Matthews.
The book was first published in 1987 in London.
Through photos published then in the book, the moment is captured when Turkish officers unlock the entrance of the hotel as well as some images from its internal state.
Impressive is the speedboat that in a very naughty and disorganized way ("haphazardly" as indicated) was placed inside the hotel lounge.
Turkish officers photograph unlocking Golden Sands entrance during inspection (photo from The Cyprus Tapes)
At least until 2019, which was the first time he was allowed to enter Turkish Cypriot (only) media, in the photos posted by Golden sands, sofas, armchairs and lamps were still in place.
Screenshots from a video leaked 10 years ago from inside the hotel:
In addition, a video is of great interest which was posted on YouTube as a tribute to Golden Sands just three weeks ago (uploaded on October 18, 2021) by an account called Morton Park Fc.
With the characteristic title The Untouched Hotel In this 22-minute video, a series of remarkable information and details about Golden Sands are presented, while the person who published it claims in the written note that accompanies the post that he entered the enclosed with special permission. ten years ago. Long before the partial opening that took place in October 2020.
A police officer I knew, he said anonymously, had told me about a place in Varosi that was like a time capsule in 1974. This place was none other than Golden Sands.
"It was a hotel, fully furnished with its dishes and crockery eating dust for decades waiting for guests who never came. He (the policeman) had seen it with his own eyes. This hotel was the Golden Sands, which officially opened its doors in 1974 and which was then considered a state of art and a breakthrough for the tourist development of the island. It only managed to stay open for a few months. "One day we hope it will work again."
Golden Sands is shown to have been erected on ecclesiastical property and in the video on YouTube, with the citation of evidence photos, reference is made to an agreement reached between Archbishop Makarios and Lord Charles Forte, who was a well-known Italian-Scottish hotelier of the time.
In his autobiography, added to the post on the Morton Park Fc account, the lord had written that he then preferred the choice of Famagusta to the Seychelles as the site for the construction of his new hotel.
At the same time, in the video, the wider Golden Sands tourist complex, which was recalled to the public just a few months before the invasion, is described as a place intended to be something like a tourist mecca of Cyprus.
Golden Sands also appears in the Christmas episode of the then popular British sitcom Steptoe and Son.
Reference is also made to the architectural design of the Golden Sands perpendicular to the beach, which, unlike other hotels in Famagusta, was built then so as not to cut off the view from the road and not to cause shading in the sea.
It is, he adds, a very careful design done by both engineers and architects who then represented the so-called Trusthouse Forte Group.
The video is locked for republishing on web pages (comments are also locked) but you can see the whole by going in the link posted.
Excerpt from the autobiography of the lord, who died in London in 2007
The hotel is an amazing example of Cypriot Modernism
Snapshot from the journalists' visit in 2019
Excerpt from a newspaper of the time
avant-garde.com.cy