Where do you live?
In Engomi, Nicosia, by myself.
What did you have for breakfast?
Oats with banana and peanut butter, cooked in oat milk, and a double Cypriot coffee, no sugar.
Describe your perfect day
A bright, clear day spent interviewing older Cypriots, preferably in a village, listening to their stories.
Best book ever read?
Anything by Ann Patchett or James McBride, because they really know how to tell a story, without ever resorting to gimmicks. Elena Ferrante’s novels (all of them, not just the Neapolitan quartet) kept me awake and made me hungry for more. Natalia Ginzburg’s Family Lexicon entranced me; the way she tells her family’s story through their very own words and expressions, and through the “little stories” each family shares, is unique. I was bereft when it finished.
Best childhood memory?
Picking flowers for the Good Friday service with my neighbourhood friends, baking flaounes at home, walking home from church at midnight, trying to keep my candle lit. Nothing beats springtime and Easter for me.
What is always in your fridge?
Oat or almond milk
What music are you listening to in the car at the moment?
Different types of Sufi music, from Nustat Fateh Ali Khan to Latif Bolat
What’s your spirit animal?
The kourkoutas. Because it’s endemic to Cyprus and needs the sun to survive.
What are you most proud of?
Persevering.
What movie scene has really stayed with you?
None. I rarely watch movies or series or TV. The only (brief) scenes I can recall are from 1960s Greek films we used to watch as kids.
If you could pick anyone at all (alive or dead) to go out for the evening with, who would it be?
My two sets of long-dead grandparents. Now I could finally ask them all the questions I couldn’t as a child.
If you could time travel, when/where would you go?
Cyprus in the early 1950s, pre-EOKA, pre-clashes, pre-division. This is the world I research, dream of, and write about.
What is your greatest fear?
Not letting go.
What would you say to your 18-year-old self?
Nothing – because she wouldn’t listen to me anyway. I’d just let her be.
Name the one thing that would stop you dating someone.
I don’t date, but I would find it challenging to share a meal with anyone who cannot forgive – in the literal sense of the Greek word, ‘συγχωρώ’: to make space for the Other. But then, this is a challenge I would welcome, if I wanted to make space for them.
If the world is ending in 24 hours, what would you do?
Try to make peace with the impending loss.
Nicoletta researches Cypriot traditional music and oral poetry, conducts ethnographic interviews and collects life stories from older Cypriots for the Cyprus Music Archive. She also teaches creative writing at The Writing Room.
Nicoletta is currently performing the role of woman bard on stage for Magdalena Zira’s play Dido, which runs until November 25. Also, new workshops are coming up at the Cyprus Music Archive on music and ethnography and The Writing Room on creative writing.
