By Dina-Perla Portnaar

I’ve moved into the house that was sold to me as fully renovated, only to discover that it’s been one thing after the other. It doesn’t stop; a meticulously curated display of moral bankruptcy.

It’s hard not to wish upon the side of the sellers 50 times the suffering they’ve inflicted on me. They refuse to pay for the most important problems, and I’ll never get back the time stolen from my life. In 25 years, I’ve never felt such hatred. It’s recognition of the abyss they caused. May Karma repay.

I found myself engaged in a Sisyphean battle against a total lack of order. On day 12, I finally had a boiler installed. Because of my health, I cannot shower cold. The technical inspector, that figure of supposed objectivity, was nothing more than a misleading and useful idiot. In the Netherlands, where I am from and standards aren’t aspirations but baseline expectations, an inspector documents every flaw with the precision of a forensic officer. The people I had on the ground here didn’t notice the defects. In the Netherlands, sellers stay liable for hidden defects for five years.

So I didn’t know about an aircon unit that still needs fixing, the inner mechanics of a toilet that needed complete replacement, the two holes outside in the garden that needed urgent closing, the glass roof I still need to install over the garden because it will flood as there’s no drain, the old aircon pipes that needed removal, the shower that was leaking (luckily a small matter), the broken wood of one door on the upper floor, the leakage under the bathroom door or the leakage stain on the upper floor indicating that the roof might have been an issue at some point.

I didn’t know about the mirror that was about to fall, open electrical wires, or sockets that needed CPR. It took uninstalling parts of the kitchen to find hidden panels. I didn’t know that all the warm and cold pipes in the house were installed the wrong way round, causing a variety of plumbing issues including boiling water flushing down a toilet. Apparently everyone knew about this structural development issue, even my boiler installer! But the sellers ‘forgot’ to tell me.

Neither did I know about the leaking bath that required a plumber’s detective work to identify a misplaced panel rather than a drain issue. The kitchen installation that leaks oil, causing brown stripes on the floor, and has a plank already succumbing to humidity. I’ve repainted terraces in the scorching heat, removed black handprints and other damages from walls and ceilings inside, and sealed cracks. I still need to do parts of the exterior.

This property was never fit for purpose. I literally rescued it. But it hasn’t rescued me yet, although I love the near future version it will be.

To those shouting “go back to where you came from”, I won’t let them rob me of my life here. I’ll rise. Yet, I will never forget, and act as a force in this society to confront its ethical decay. These types of issues always come back to bite Cyprus.Because I arrived with hope and just became easy prey. The sellers are a symbol of the embodiment of a culture that tolerates exploitation of foreigners. Within the EU… Unaccountability is a catastrophe of regulation, enforcement and collective conscience. Cyprus will reap what it has sowed. The boomerang of betrayal never misses its mark.