A song dedicated to Cyprus’ EU presidency has gone viral on the internet over the last two days with some convinced it’s a spoof while others believe it to be the official song.
The song “You are welcome friends to Cyprus,” sang by Stavros Hadjisavvas, with lyrics by Leonidas Malenis, opens with a shot of Petra tou Romiou and Hadjisavvas – clad completely in white – rising from a rock clutching two olive branches.
It cuts to shots of Hadjisavvas singing and waving the branches in front of his face, along with shots of an Aphrodite statue rising from the waves, with Hadjisavvas singing alternately in Greek and English: ‘Soon you’ll find yourselves walking with Lady Aphrodite. And when the time comes to say goodbye, think of the next time you’ll be coming by.’
The song has four versions; Greek-English, modern Greek, English, and the Greek-Cypriot dialect.
Hadjisavvas said the song was recorded as a dedication to the presidency and was not trying to be an official song.
“The title is inspired from a line from Shakespeare’s Othello ‘you are welcome Sir to Cyprus,’” said Hadjisavvas.
Despite the serious effort by Hadjisavvas and Malenis some of the comments on Facebook yesterday ranged from ‘this is so bad even Eurovision would have rejected it,’ and ‘Oh my God I am so ashamed of my country’.
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Even the comments on YouTube show a similar dislike with a meagre 41 likes but a whopping 1,222 dislikes and counting, with comments such as: ‘Guys please this must be a parody or a joke or something…the? song writing…was it done on Google translate…was it done using donations?’
So far-reaching is the level of aversion to the song that a Facebook page has also been created called ‘Get out of our country’ which also suggests several places where the singer could be exiled.
Hadjisavvas appeared troubled by the fact that people had been misinformed on the purpose of the song saying: “All of this over the last day and a half is because of a number of blogs (that have been giving people the wrong impression).”
Where is the crime or sin? he said.
Rumours also emerged that Hadjisavvas had approached the Cyprus Tourism Organisation (CTO) to promote the song. CTO refused, according to Hadjisavvas. CTO could not be reached for comment.
Following a great deal of hype and misinformation, Costas Yennaris, spokesman for Cyprus’ EU presidency announced yesterday that they had no affiliation with the song.
A representative at the Cyprus EU presidency secretariat confirmed this saying that they did not consider a song necessary.
Hadjisavvas and Malenis are due to present their CD, which contains the song on June 22 at 8pm at Famagusta Gate. The event will be sponsored by various bodies, including Parliament, centre-right DIKO, Cyprus Airways, the Defence Ministry and the Health Ministry among others.
(source: cyprus-mail)
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