It's like asking how someone in England descended from the Huguenots (who emigrated en masse to England during the 1600s from France) can possibly call themselves English.
I disagree completely! The Turkish-Cypriots speak Turkish and share the same religion as main-land Turks, but I do understand what you mean.
you are a descendent of a people who invaded and colonised someone else's domain...
This may sound kinda stupid, but I heard from someone (can't remember who but definately nobody from my Greek school, it was somebody on the net) that Greeks were always there. Wikipedia does nothing to suggest that others were there before, just that Alexander the Great annexed the country.
And seriously, I'm not learning this from Greek school teachers
We celebrated some independance day (of Greece I think, not Cyprus) or other in March, and the head-teacher (who is Cypriot) said that the Turkish occupied for 400 years. Since then another teacher (from Thessalonica in Greece) said that many Greeks were forced to live in Turkey (among whom were her mother as a young child with her family) and they weren't allowed to go to Greece. Also, Greek infants were kidnapped and brought up by Turkish families, weren't told about their true heritage, and then were sent to Greece having being preached that Greeks were an evil race, and they shot their own people. I have no reason to doubt her, and knowing the kind of person she is, I would imagine that she accepts full responsibilty of the Greeks also. I see the 1974 war of Cyprus as the Greeks lashing out after years of secret torture. Like Turkish-Cypriot police beating Greeks, killing them off and so on.
Leon.
