Getting drunk (and fat) with the mayor

Last night around 9 PM Barb and I decided to go eat dinner at a cute little outdoor restaurant in the walled part of Nicosia, also known as the old city. We debated whether or not to get meze because we weren't sure if we were hungry enough for it. With meze here, you don't choose which plates to order like you do with meze or tapas in the U.S. You order meze for two and then you just wait as they bring plate after plate after plate of surprises. You never know what or how much you're going to get but it's always a lot. But it is the most awesome food ever so no matter how full you are, you just have to keep eating! So we ordered the meze and some Keo (local beer) and ate and drank until we were ready to have the waiter roll us home. We even ate the snails, because we are trying to broaden our horizons or whatever. But as we were finishing up a white-haired man probably in his early 60's came over and shook our hands and asked us if we were enjoying our dinner. We assumed he was the manager or cook or something so we just said "Yes, thank you, "but he just kind of stood there.
"Do you know who I am?" he asked us. Barb and I just looked at each other and then back at him like, uh...are we supposed to? Turns out he is the mayor of Nicosia and he and his wife were sitting down at the table behind us. Everyone else at the restaurant was clearly aware of this.

He sat down at the table with his wife but continued to talk to us, introducing us to his wife, telling us whats good and what we should've ordered, and asking us if we wanted more beers on him. We've read numerous times that when a Greek Cypriot offers you something, you just don't turn them down. Especially if it has to do with food or their company. Plus were not the type to turn down free beer, so even though we were stuffed, we said sure. But that turned into "Would you like to join us?" Uh oh...food AND company-related; we knew had no choice. So sure enough we got up from our table and went to sit at theirs. Michael the mayor ordered beer after beer after beer for us and insisted that we try all of their food, because even though we might've had it before, we had to try it with yogurt, or lemon, or this or that. So, we did. At this point we were so stuffed we thought we were going to be sick. Then they ordered dessert (a whole 'nother story). But anyway, they were really interesting and very sweet people and they gave us a whole history lesson on Nicosia and Cyprus and talked about their children and grandchildren and their house in the mountains and their other house on the beach, etc, etc. This man, prior to being Mayor of Nicosia was the founder of Cooper Greece and Cooper Cyprus (of Price, Waterhouse, and Cooper). So, needless to say it was fine with us when he picked up our tab in addition to all of the food and beer we had of theirs! Basically we had two free dinners and about a keg of Keo on the mayor.