My New Life in Malta

There is a steadily growing trend of xenophobic feeling in Malta that has me worried. It is still relatively minor, with people passing little comments here and there. But that is how it all starts and I see it growing. And like all prejudices, one begins to hear the same clichés over and over again about immigrants, particularly directed at  refugees from African countries:

“They are taking our jobs!”

“They are dangerous!”

“They all congregate together around Marsa [town near the refugee open centre] and you do not want to be there at night!”

Just this morning, a Maltese acquaintance decided to make small talk with me by saying “Malta is filling up with black people!”  I think she was a bit surprised that instead of agreeing, I challenged her:

ME: “So?”

Mrs. X: “Well, I am scared of them.”

ME: “Why? We are all the same inside.”

Mrs. X: “Not the same, their skin is black!”

ME: “So? We are all the same inside.”

Mrs. X: “I saw that your neighbour is black with a Maltese wife, but their daughter is not black, she is more like her mother.”

ME: “Yes, and the next-door neighbours are Arab, and upstairs there is a woman from Bosnia. It is a very international street. You know, in my country it is like that. We have people who are black, white, Indian, Chinese, and all the mixes.”

Mrs. X: “But your skin, it is light, you are like us.”

ME: “Well, yes. But we are all the same. We are all children of God.” [I say smugly, knowing that the Maltese like to see themselves as good Catholics]

Mrs. X: “Well, yes, that is true. But I don’t know, we Maltese, we are different.”

ME: “If you go to London or Paris, you will see people of many colours and countries. That is the way the world is.”

She gave me an unconvinced look. Overall I felt she was a bit taken aback that I did not just agree and further fuel her sentiments.

What worries me is that this was not an isolated incident. I am hearing these types of comments more and more. I hear people complain about too many black people on buses, too many black people on the streets. Over and over again I have heard people complain that they  are angered to see black people with mobile phones or out in the pubs and discos in Paċeville. How ridiculous! As if it is wrong for someone to buy a mobile phone just because he is black and came here as a refugee! There is also the mistaken assumption that all black people are refugees, or that they are all poor and uneducated.

The problem, of course, is ignorance and lack of exposure to people who are different. Like my acquaintance mentioned above, who is a sweet lady and did not mean any harm. She just has lived in a small village in Malta all her life and does not know any better.

As with most world problems, I do not really have a perfect solution. But perhaps the media should stop demonising refugees as some cancer on society. More compassion should be shown. The news stories should focus on individual people and the horrible circumstances that lead a person to put his or her own life at risk and set to sea on an unreliable raft. THAT is a point that needs to be stressed and nobody seems to think about. I cannot stress it enough.

And it is very much a racial problem. When it comes to black people, the argument is quickly brought up that Malta is small and there is not enough space. However, since Malta joined the European Union it has to adhere to freedom of movement, and people do not seem to be too troubled by the fact that there are over 300 million EU citizens that are free to come and settle here in Malta any time they want. Is it because they are (mostly) white?

Up until last week it was hot and sunny. Summer seemed to be hanging on, but it was now bearable to be outside in the sun. And then, overnight, autumn set in. I reluctantly put away my shorts and put on trousers. Then a couple of days ago the WIND picked up. Apparently this happens every year around this time (and I distinctly remember it from last October). I am glad to hear that climate change has not yet completely changed the Maltese weather patterns.

Living in a new place, it is good to find people who have gone through the same experiences and with whom you can relate. While neither LD nor I are the type to sit and speak badly about Malta (which seems to be many expats’ favourite activity), there are genuine grievances and difficulties that are good to let out. Maybe one of these days we should go to Gozo and look up Sabine!

The blog has been a bit silent over the last couple of weeks. I was kept busy showing around my friend J, who came to visit all the way from Beijing! (So all of you out there who live any closer than China, you cannot pull the excuse that Malta is too far away )

It was so nice to have a visitor. We wound up seeing things that I had not seen in a while, and even discovering new places around the island that I did not yet know.

On a tour of Mdina, for example, we went into the newly renovated Palazzo Falzon. It recently opened to the public, and allows the visitor a glimpse into one of Mdina’s palazzi while doubling up as a museum showcasing the last owner’s collection of antiques and priceless artifacts. The view from the rooftop café rivals that of Fontanella, but without the famous desserts. There was also the “standard” tour of Valletta’s many attractions, parks, museums and streets, and of course the prehistoric temples and ancient catacombs around the island.

To top things off, we took the catamaran over to Sicily and enjoyed a few days of Italian-ness. Always a good time for this Italophile. Thank you J for your very generous invitation!

After a few days, I asked J about her impressions of Malta and how they matched up to her expectations. She said she did not really know what to expect, other than expecting it not to be Italy. In the end she could only describe Malta as unique and difficult to describe. That is just about what I always say. People ask me if it is like Italy, or Greece, or like a piece of Britain in the Mediterranean… but it is none of those things.

Now for a euro update. I might just be the single most excited person in the country about this topic, but now others can share in my excitement because very large euro-countdown clocks have been put up around the island. I have seen three so far, including one sprawled across Bieb il-Belt/City Gate in Valletta. The days, hours, minutes and seconds tick away, one second at a time, reminding everyone that in less than three months the new currency will be here. M admits a certain sadness at the lira passing away into history, which I can understand. However, the Maltese euro coin design is so popular that tourists are talking about taking them home with them as souvenirs as soon as they become available on 1 January. I wonder if that will be a boost to the Maltese economy, if people plan to take away coins without spending them!

And, I might be unusually excited and informed about this topic, but I was shocked to learn that a friend of mine who just finished university had NO IDEA when the euro was being adopted, what the exchange rate was, or how the whole transition process will work. While I do not expect everyone to know all the details, it was really an eye-opener. I wonder how many people in Malta are confused about the euro and its upcoming adoption.

Today Malta celebrates 43 years since its independence from Britain, which put an end to millenia of being ruled by just about every major power in the Euro-Mediterranean area. Phoenicians, Carthagenians, Romans, Byzantines, Arabs, Sicilians, Spanish, Knights of St. John, British… they all left their mark on the islands and contributed to its unique and distinct culture and identity.

I wish everyone in Malta a happy Jum l-Indipendenza!!

Our flat is a clean place. M and I are clean people and always make an effort to have tidy living quarters. However, we decided that perhaps once a month we should have a professional come in and do a thorough cleaning of the entire place. In between these expert interventions, we can just do some light upkeep around the house.

So, the search was on to find a good cleaner who could come at regular intervals. As with most things in Malta, we went on word-of-mouth. M’s sister suggested her own cleaning lady. We figured that somebody who is able to clean a big house belonging to a family with teenagers should have no trouble with our little two-person dwellings.

The recommended lady showed up at the agreed time, and I busied myself on the computer as she did her work. So you can imagine how very, shall we say, surprised I was when after a very short while she came up to me and said “I am finished, I am leaving now” with the confidence of somebody who had finished all her tasks. I had not heard the vacuum cleaner at all. As far as I could tell, she had not been in the bedroom. In fact, she had not even gone into the kitchen, where I had been the entire time. I did not know what to say. Perhaps in Malta things are done this way? Perhaps there are certain things that are just not done by cleaners? And so when M came home, I told him what had happened and added that at least in my non-Maltese perspective sweeping the floors and ironing a few shirts did not constitute proper house-cleaning. That was the last time she came.

Next, M’s mother offered the lady that has been helping her with the housework for years. She even offered to come with her to make sure that things got done properly. It was an offer we could not refuse. They showed up one morning, and I even went out so as not to get in their way. We both came home later to find dust still on tables. But it is very difficult to complain to one’s mother/mother-in-law about such a thing. She was a bit offended. And so we thought it best to keep family out of this matter.

What to do? We continued searching, and finally M’s good friend D said that he had a lady that came once a month and did a thorough job of his flat, where he lives alone. It sounded exactly like what we needed! He told us that she charges a bit more than usual, but she is worth every ċenteżmu. And so we gave it one more try.

D’s recommendation is a sweet lady from Rabat, who must be in her late 50’s. We had a chat with her before she began, and I explained in my staggering Maltese (this was a few months back) that we had just had a woman who swept, ironed and left, and that we really expected her to do more. She then turned to M and asked “what did he say?”  At least my language skills have improved since then.

This time we made a list of what we considered basic: vacuuming, cleaning bathroom and kitchen, dusting where there was dust. Pretty simple, wouldn’t you say? We also agreed that there were other, less pressing things that could be rotated. One time she could do the balcony windows, another time she could sweep the balcony, occasionally the kitchen window, etc.

She turned out to be excellent. The house was left spotless. She was a keeper!

Since I am usually the one who is home when she comes to clean, she and I have developed a nice friendship. She is one of those relatively few Maltese who really struggles to speak English. Even though at first she would not answer me in Maltese, just like most locals do not, with time she has warmed up to the idea that instead of struggling with English she can just chat away to me in Maltese. (At least part of the time. Old habits die hard). Because believe me, she looooooooves to chat. A lot. All the time. About everything. Whether I am listening or not. Sometimes she even chats to herself. It is really charming to watch.

There are only a few caveats to follow. For example, if we leave out any dishes or pans, she will put them away where she thinks they should go, which can lead us to have to hunt all over the kitchen for them later. So I now make sure they are all put away before she arrives. The other thing is that she does not believe in recycling, so she throws everything out. In fact she throws out whatever she deems to be rubbish. So I do a quick check around the flat and make sure to put away anything that she might consider rubbish. And I take out the recyclables before she can get to them.

This morning she told me of her upcoming holiday to Corfu. It will be her first time on an airplane, and her first time outside of Malta except for three short visits to Catania in Sicily. What a great country, where cleaning ladies can take holidays on the Greek islands!

The other day, I got an e-mail from a Peruvian living in Italy who had come across my blog. Never having met in person, he told me to contact a Peruvian friend of his living in Malta! What a small and cyber-connected world it has become.

I rang the Peruvian (whom I will call “Maria” in keeping with my blog’s anonymity) and as fate would have it she lives just down the street from me, so we decided to meet up that very evening. So far, all the foreigners I have met in Malta are Europeans, North Americans and a couple of Israelis. And so I was very interested to meet some “third world” immigrants and to learn about their experiences and perspectives.

I found Maria at the agreed spot and she gave me two kisses, Maltese style (Peruvians only give one). Sign number one that she has been integrating. We chatted a bit about each other and how we wound up here. By her count, there are 11 Peruvians on the island, and the first question is clear: how did they wind up HERE?

She ran down a mental list. Almost everyone has a Maltese spouse. There were others here before but have since moved on to different countries of mainland Europe, in search of more opportunities. There are the Peruvian musicians that I keep hearing about but have never seen. (Everyone says that they play music on the streets, but after one year I have yet to run into them). Her own case is a bit different: she worked with Maltese priests doing missionary work in Lima, and wound up coming back with them on a visit over four years ago. She has not left since.

And when I say she has not left since, that is not a euphemism. Unlike all of the “first world” immigrants that I mentioned above, Peruvians cannot travel so easily. Peru is a very poor country and used to have a terrorist movement (used to, I should add, no longer does!!! But the rest of the world seems to have missed that fact), and so that brands its passport holders as the target of suspicion and hostility by many immigration officers in the “first world” countries. Maria has tried twice to go to Sicily just for a day trip, but has been denied a visa. It really puts all of this RyanAir cheap-flight craze in perspective.

Luckily and with some connections, she has been able to obtain work permits that have kept her status legal and employable. But every year it must be renewed, and every year there is the apprehension of being denied. Despite all of this, she seems to be happy making her new life here and seems pretty determined to remain. She has had Maltese boyfriends and speaks nearly flawless English now, with a slight Maltese accent no less! That is another point. Most Europeans arrive here speaking English, but in Peru very few people do. Learning the language well was another of her challenges.

Then she introduced me to another Peruvian, whom I will call “José” though I fear anonymity might not work in this case. He sells Peruvian handicrafts and CD’s of his Andean music in the streets of Malta, and so many of my readers must have seen him. So, without compromising his privacy, I will summarise and say that his story was also pretty unique. Based in Brazil and Italy, he comes to Malta every summer to sell his wares as the island’s population swells with tourists. I do not know how he first came upon this rock, but he has kept coming back for several years.

I asked if he needs a permit to sell on the street. He does, though by now people know him and do not really bother him with formalities. He recounted how the other day he was selling in Valletta and the police came round and were about to remove him, but the local workers who have known him for years came out in his defence and convinced the police to leave him alone. That was refreshing to hear. These days there is, unfortunately, somewhat of a racist and anti-foreigner feeling going around in Malta, basically aimed at the African boat refugees. So I was happy to hear that there are still people with clean hearts and minds that are willing to stand up for a friend, even if he looks and speaks differently.

It was José who asked if I spoke Maltese. I said I do speak it pretty well. What about Maria?  “Mhux ħażin” she replied, telling us that she can understand some but does not speak it well. It was more than I expected! But again, perhaps I have been influence by most (European) immigrants’ attitude that learning Maltese is not necessary, further reinforced by the Maltese population’s insistence that learning Maltese by a foreigner is not expected and, in my experience, almost mocked. She did say that she has little opportunity or reason to use it, which I can certainly understand. And José? He said he has picked up a few phrases only, but that he finds it useless because he cannot use the language in any other country. Considering he does not live here full time, I can see his point, but my feeling is still that you can use the language here and that is where I live.

It was a surreal evening, sitting there talking to them while José sold his handicrafts. Lost in conversation, I felt like I was back in Lima. Then I would look around me and realise that I was in Malta. For a while, I was on the other side of the looking-glass, seeing locals and tourists perusing his merchandise, haggling over the price, trying things on. I thought of how all of these people know nothing about the stories behind the man doing the selling. I wondered what preconceived notions they had of him and how he wound up in Malta, or if they even thought about it at all.

Now for a much lighter topic.

The one-year contract one our cable system finally expired. (This nearly coincides with the first anniversary of my arrival in Malta , an event which passed without any fanfare).

One of the nice perks of life in Europe is the ability to watch TV from many different countries. However, our cable provider did not have the Spanish or French stations, which are the two I really would have liked (in addition to Maltese, Italian and BBC, which come standard in Malta ). So, we switched to the other company. There might not be too much consumer choice on these islands, but there is at least enough competition around to provide an alternative in some areas. And so, a few days ago we got hooked-up to a new array of channels.

I can finally listen to Spanish television, as well as brush up on my French which is a bit rusty. But we got more than we bargained for… there are also two German channels, more Italian channels than we had before, different English language stations and even two in Arabic. You have probably figured out by now that I am a language dork, so this is heaven for me. I sat in awe going from channel to channel, but wound up being particularly fascinated by the Arabic station.

A commercial showing a woman with a veil trying a facial soap really caught my eye as pretty hilarious. Wouldn’t she remove it, so as not to get it wet? Soon, the Arabic version of “Who Wants to be a Millionaire?” came on the screen. Then some melodramatic telenovela came on, M joined me on the couch, and we were hooked. I keep hearing that Arab speakers can understand Maltese, but definitely not the other way around. However, I was able pick up words and phrases here and there. And since M is a native Maltese speaker and studied a bit of Arabic, he picked up a lot more. It was amusing that I was able to understand some of the commercials, however. During another program, I picked out enough words to figure out that the woman being interviewed was the daughter of Egypt ’s deposed King Farouk. Looks like Maltese winds up being useful outside the islands as well!

But the fun did not stop there. We also have access to several international radio stations! A bit odd, perhaps, to receive radio on the television. The main Maltese ones are all there, as well as many European ones. I will now publicly embarrass both myself and M by stating that when we discovered that we have the Bollywood Greatest Hits station, we celebrated by doing a little dance reminiscent of Hindi movies in accompaniment to the music.

They say the key to happiness is finding joy in the little things in life…

And as the year cycles around, tonight marks the beginning of the Jewish New Year (Rosh Hashanah) once again. I wish a happy, sweet and healthy new year to all my blog readers of all religions.

Warning: angry rant below.

A couple of days ago, we received a post card from the Minister of Tourism and Culture. It is written in a font that makes it look like it is handwritten, which is some type of unsuccessful attempt to make us believe he wrote each one himself.

The card is addressed to us as a family. How very nice of the Hon. Francis Zammit Dimech to acknowledge that two men living together as a couple constitute a family. I almost want to send him a (real) handwritten post card in return, thanking him for his acknowledgement and asking if he would care to accompany that with any of the rights that other foreigners enjoy when married to a Maltese citizen.

Mostly, he thanks us for making this a year of record tourism in Malta. He even goes so far as to say that “l-impenn u x-xogħol tiegħek bħala Malti żgur għent bil-kbir biex fit-turiżmu akkwistajna dawn ir-riżultati eċċellenti.”  Well, I am flattered Francis. Too bad that I am not Maltese and cannot even obtain any kind of residence status because of your government’s old-fashioned and homophobic laws. Perhaps if your colleagues in Parliament passed some laws similar to those of most Western countries, I might just be Maltese enough to be a productive member of society and help out in your tourism goals. And your letter addressed to us as a family would acknowledge a legal reality instead of a de facto situation.

(While we are at it, I calculate that in order to send this card to every household in the country, postage alone must have cost around Lm16,000/€34,269.97. What a wonderful use of taxpayers’ money).

Feeling a bit frustrated today… can you tell?

It has been a while since I have talked about the trials and tribulations of my language learning.

Often one wonders whether there is any improvement in learning a language. For a while now I have felt a bit stuck and wondering if I will ever make that next “leap” into a greater fluency of Maltese. Well, today I realised that I have made great progress.

The car’s window handle fell off. You know, the one you use to roll down the window. The tricky part is that it is made of plastic, but the matching part on the door is made of metal. So, I made my way down to the store today in order to find the elusive glue or cement that could fix this situation. This time I promised myself that I would not fall into the crutch of English unless absolutely necessary. And I succeeded!

Many Maltese throw in English words and phrases, especially when dealing with modern terminology. And so, I did the same. I marched right in and said, “għandi bżon xi glue that sticks to metall u plastik.” Yes, only half in Maltese, but it sounded like something that someone here would say. It worked! I was answered in Maltese, and we carried on back and forth as I explained about the car’s window handle and the odd predicament I was in. For once, I was not answered in English, even though I had to resort to some English words here and there.

When I first started tackling this language, M had told me that there is a certain way in which Maltese speakers throw in English words and that it would take me a while to grasp when it is “acceptable” to throw in English terms, and which ones, and still be considered to be speaking Maltese. I am proud to say that it seems I am finally getting the idea.

To complicate matters, the glue we finally settled on had all the instructions written in Italian. (As I have mentioned before, foreign products sold in Malta will usually be translated into English, except for Italian ones. Enough people understand Italian that it is not deemed necessary). While I do speak Italian better than Maltese, my vocabulary does not exactly cover the chemical properties of glue products. The sales attendant seemed to have a similar limitation, but somehow we worked it out and decided that this one should work.

I was so happy to hear “65 cents jekk jogħoġbok…” instead of “65 cents please…”  Slowly but surely, I will master this language!

While on the topic of language in Malta , I wanted to bring up a cultural observation. It feels like whenever a Maltese person makes a point or challenges a statement, they qualify their statement with “in my opinion” usually with a hand gesture that seems to want to say “so you can’t say I’m wrong, you can’t dismiss me, it is my opinion and opinions can’t be challenged” or something to that effect. It really looks insecure, IN MY OPINION (ha ha ha!). If you live in Malta , listen for it and you will see it. It is used ALL the time! Why is this necessary? I am not an arrogant person, but I do not feel the need to qualify things I say with, “in my opinion…”  If I feel what I have to say is right, I just say it and take full responsibility for my words. Has anyone else been bothered by this?

Last night Malta was given a very special treat. A concert was organised on the Valletta Waterfront that brought three greats of Italian music to the island: Claudio Baglioni, Riccardo Cocciante and Gianni Morandi! The best part of it was that it was FREE!

The concert was supposed to bring awareness about illegal immigration, which is an important topic in Malta at the moment as I have mentioned before. Apparently they do it every year on the Italian island of Lampedusa , a tiny one smaller than Malta and even closer to the African coast that also receives hundreds of refugees every week. (The difference is that they can be sent to the Italian mainland, while Malta is running out of space where to house them while they process their asylum claims). While a few passing references were made about this problem, mostly it was a fun concert and the crowd was very excited to see these singers.

A love of Italian music is something I share with a large part of the Maltese population, and while I am not familiar with these singers in particular, I still enjoyed it very much. Everyone was singing along and getting excited as the three famous singers improvised, sang together and let out their old classics. Claudio Baglione even sang a song in Maltese, which the crowd found amusing. (I heard a lot of too-exagerated surprised gasps that a foreigner would sing in Maltese, but we all know this is a topic that annoys me and I do not feel like going on about it at great length right now. YES people, it is possible for a foreigner to sing in Maltese, and NO it is not that difficult. Plenty of singers sing versions of their songs in other languages by simply learning them by heart. But I digress.)

As a warm-up, there were three Maltese singers. First, one whose name escapes me but he had no voice and the crowd was not exactly impressed. Then the band Wintermoods, which raised the spirit a bit, and then Malta ’s international pop star Ira Losco. I had never heard her sing, and I was pleasantly surprised. Not only does she have a talented voice, but she really defines stage presence. She really knew how to bring up the crowd!

A funny aside is that the presenter of the concert was Italian television personality Fabrizio Frizzi. He hosts a TV contest show called “I soliti ignoti” that M and I sometimes watch. It was exciting for me to see a TV personality in the flesh. It is not like I ever get to meet any Hollywood actors, but I certainly did not expect any Italian ones to be flying in to Malta !

The whole experience was an interesting example of language use in Malta . The presenter and singers spoke almost entirely in Italian, confident that the Maltese would understand everything, which they did. There was a Maltese co-presenter who said a few things in Maltese throughout the night, with the occasional bits in English here and there. I felt very at ease, being able to follow it all.

Though I had expected chaos at the offer of a free concert, everything was very well organised and ran very smoothly. One of the nicest things I noticed was that there were people of all ages present, from little children to some elderly people. Everyone stood for hours and shared in a collective atmosphere of happiness.

At the end of the night, everyone joined in to “Volare” which happens to be one of my favourite tunes. Finally a song that I knew! I happily belted out “nel blu… dipinto di blu…” with the crowd.