In Malta

Pro Nuptiae

�They say that love is blind and marriage is an institution. I am still not
ready for an institution for the blind.�

My visit to Malta this Easter was sort of forced. I had not planned for a homecoming before May but then a very good friend of mine announced his plans to get married on St. Joseph�s feast and so I postponed any plans of discovering another corner of Europe in deference to this monumental occasion. All my close friends from the magnificent Law Class of �99 have caught the matrimonial bug over the past few years. The leftover bachelors are few and far between and our numbers are dwindling.

Considering that out of the remaining four, two will almost surely be marrying within the next year that just leaves me and the evergreen Chris Grime without any rings on our fingers. I am not worried about this and feel reassured by the fact that everyone has their own time and pace.

A bachelor�s life in Malta is different to that on the continent. I find the slight hints of �bachelor equals irresponsible bastard� moderately irritating. I tend to find the illogical dilemma between the eternal postponement of marriage and the constant craving for offspring more confusing. Yep. I confess. I want kids. Four of them, preferably, and a mixture of femmes and hommes. I am reading a highly recommendable light entertainment book which takes bachelors and married life as its main subject � �the best a man can get" by john o�farrell. If you can get your hands on it it will be a good book for next summer�s sun-bathing afternoons.

Meanwhile back in the city

Wedding apart, Malta has not shied away from providing various issues of entertainment throughout my stay. I love the petrol crisis. From Luxembourg the lack of gas cylinders seemed almost surreal. Driving past queues and queues of cars waiting patiently to fill their tank before the petrol-strike-that-never-really-came set in was the best kind of homecoming. Don�t get me wrong. I do not like the fact that things still happen this way in this country. My amusement is however fired by this wry knowledge that these things happen because we still let them happen. We let the GWU think it knows what is best for the country's workers by supporting it in the thousands. We are bred to support our duopoly and give no breathing space to new ideas� no... we strangle them at birth in a country where the only abortion permissible is that of new ideas.

I supported Alternattive Demokratika in the last European elections. I do not consider myself a partitarju � a party member or supporter. My hope was just that it was the right time to send a message that new ideas, though not the final solution, could certainly help infuse Maltese politics with new directions. And forget about the new spring. It will never come the way we are going. An eluded Labour party believing it is winning simply because it is hanging on to its core will just not do. The non-voters who wisely protest by not turning up at Local Councils elections however will never be able to really positively express their need for change because unfortunately there are no alternatives.

No ideas. No gas. No petrol.

Let us just all lie back in the sun and relax.

I�m afraid its in the genes.

Parking

What is it with this country�s hatred of proper organized transport and parking? I am a part-time Paceville resident with a vested interest in the solution of parking problems for residents of Malta�s centre of alcotainment. The local council of St. Julian�s seems to be trying to solve the problems of our Borough (yeah wishful thinking). It�s just that the business people believe that organized parking is not a solution for the area. Good parking is bad business. It scares customers. Rubbish.

In Luxembourg any trip to the city also involves payment for parking. Up to �4 can be paid on an expensive night. No one complains. No long queues of traffic and the 4 parkings around the city centre serve their purpose. Customers still custom, patrons patronise and businessmen still do their business. I just believe that we always want the easy way out. The Paceville businessman is used to milking the easy money � ready to milk the last youngster's last cent by selling cheap beer. The basest form of business remained the Lm1 bottles of water in discotheques who abused of the ecstatic revelers' necessity for H2O. They never complain about taxis costing the earth. They never thought that lobbying for an efficient Night Transport Service will add business, add customers, and solve transport and jamming problems. No. They just want the easy buck. Oppose progress. Be destructive so long as the money (hopefully) rolls in. Outside the door of their establishment lies another world� and they do not care in the least.

It pains me to write this because I do know that there are some hard working individuals who would love to earn the honest buck but it just goes to show the inability of Maltese to think in terms of the common good.

So long for now.

I am off to watch Neverland again, but this time in Valletta� our very own Neverland.

And by the way� this blog might switch to Maltese�.