This morning, we visited Vassos Eliades Ltd. who own the sole rights to distribute Nestle products such as Nespresso within Cyprus. They also partner with many different other brands resulting in them working with 85 suppliers in 19 countries to be able to support 5,300 clients in Cyprus and some parts of Greece. While learning about their facilities we sat in one of their training rooms. This training room to me was very interesting as it had a full coffee bar, wine rack, and alcohol bar located inside the room. Vassos Eliades seems to be a company that is very proud of their partnerships with other businesses, throughout their facilities and offices they have on display many products that they distribute and store in their warehouses.
After lunch we went back to UNIC to attend two lectures. The first lecture was hosted by Dr. Emilios A. Solomon on the History of Cyprus. His lecture provided many interesting facts about the history of Cyprus and was a riveting experience. One thing that stood out to me in his lecture was the fact that Cyprus between the years 1191 AD and 1192 AD, the island traded hands three times. First to Richard the Lion Heart who conquered the island and then he gave it to the Knights Templar who ruled the island until overthrown by the french in 1192. Another fact that stood out to me was that the reason the country outline of Cyprus in their flag is orange is because during the summer months everything dries out making the country look orange. The lecture was different from ones I’ve attended at Pitt; Dr. Solomon provided many images for context within his lecture which allowed me to have a deeper understanding of the different eras of Cypriot rule he was discussing.