Another UPDATE as of May 12, 2013: I received a wonderful response in the comments section below. Please see the comment below to find it on googlemaps. Thank you, Vips Uth!
UPDATE as of March 5, 2013: I got the directions to the Chinese supermarket wrong. It’s much further than I thought.
Here is the address:
Tel: 22430058
Fax: 22003688
Actually, I don’t know if it’s famous, but we had heard about a Chinese supermarket that sells tofu in Nicosia. We had been meaning to go for weeks, but never got around to it until this past Saturday.
We had bought prepackaged soft tofu at our local grocery store when we first moved to Cyprus, but since the expiration date hasn’t changed since December 2012, we thought it would be best to look elsewhere. Alphamega had tofu, but it was some strange color, over priced, and the worst tasting tofu we ever had in our life. We figured that tofu should be nixed from our diet for the duration of our time in Cyprus.
After eradicating mold in the kids’ room, we rewarded ourselves with a trip to the Chinese market. Prof quickly found the supermarket nearby the Hard Rock Cafe in Nicosia. It was pretty easy to spot from the street. After all, the store sign said, “Chinese” written in English on the canopy in front of the store. It was quite tiny, maybe about 8 ft. x 12 ft. of store space.
And would you guess the first thing I saw in the shop? Ko-chu-jang! Who knew that they sell this stuff!
Then the nice Chinese-speaking cashier spoke in Mandarin really, really fast. I am talking lighting speed. She assumed Prof was Chinese, and starting to say a whole bunch of stuff.
I had taken about three years of Mandarin (audit-only), and I remembered a handful of sayings. All I could get out in Chinese was that we weren’t Chinese, but Korean. I am sure the intonations were incorrect, but she knew exactly what we were saying.
The owner of the store came out and spoke perfect English. We asked him how he came to Cyprus, and he said it was a long story. However, the condensed version was this:
He came to Cyprus to start an off-shore drilling company with someone else, but the Gulf War put a halt to that. He had to make a change, and so he started this Chinese supermarket over 20 years ago.
And though we missed buying the last batch of tofu at the supermarket, our dear friend from church had picked up some for us, and gave us two major packages! Score! Thanks, A! You made our day!
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Is it by Wagamama’s? I can’t find an Agiou Dimitris in Nicosia… I only see a Andrea Dimitris near Wagamamas and the ministry of finance. Did you happen to notice if they sold bao or bao flour?
Oh no, it’s much further away, more towards the east side of the city. My apologies for not knowing the exact directions around Nicosia. Have you tried calling the shop? I found the address info. on one of the Cyprus forums. Oh, and I don’t know if they sell bao flour. The owner of the shop speaks English, and he should be able to tell you the directions and what they have in stock. Hope they have what you are looking for!
I’ve marked it on a Google map I keep handy: http://goo.gl/maps/E5Pqt . Parking is a bit difficult – I’ve usually parked on the side street just before it. From the map, it’s on Digeni Akrita not Agiou Dimitris.
Thank you so much for that! I will edit it to the correct street. Thanks again!