The Red Tower, Cottonera lines and the Knights' navy

Sunday began with breakfast in the rooftop restaurant of the Castille hotel overlooking Grand Harbour.  I was booked to join a Heritage Malta trail exploring Military and Naval aspects of 16th/17th Century Malta meeting outside Hotel Phoenicia in Floriana at 8.45.  I estimated that the walk over from my hotel (quarter of the price of Hotel Phoenicia!) would take me 5 minutes but I didn't expect the St James' Cavalier walkway to be closed and so it took me longer and I was the last to arrive as they were loading up the bus.  My heart sank as I saw the number of people who were piling onto the bus and I found I missed out on a window seat.   I sat in silent agitation as we drove the length of the island to the Red Tower of Mellieha.

The Red Tower is so-called because it was painted red rather than leaving the yellow stone exposed as with most of the buildings in Malta.  One theory is that the colour made it more visible in the mist that sometimes covers Malta but whatever the reason, when the tower was being restored Din L'Art Helwa, Malta's Heritage Trust, insisted on painting the tower red.  The formal name for the tower is St Agatha's and it was built in 1647-8 during the reign of Grand Master Lascaris.  I first came across St Agatha when I was in Sicily and staying in Catania.  The story of her martyrdom is horrible and I have started to wonder about the knights' obsession with women who died awful deaths resisting the advances of men.  St Agatha was from Sicily and spurned the advances of her Roman lover who then had her persecuted and put to death by having her breasts cut off with shears and then burnt at the stake.  The dedication to her in the chapel of the tower translates: "To those who wage war, I the Martyr Agatha, with breasts removed stand here, a fearless tower faithful and a threat to my enemies well known throughout the world."

Not surprisingly, the 360 view from the tower is stunning.  When I was taking photos across the straits to Gozo, a woman told me proudly that I was taking a photo of her parish church.  The tower was part of a line of fortification that ran from Gozo through Comino and along the beaches on the North-eastern side of the island (the South-western cliffs were considered impregnable).  The towers protected against invasion from the sea at that particular point but were also a chain of communication to alert the island to threat.  Messages were sent by flags during the daytime and fire at night.

The hike up to the tower restored my positive view on life and the return journey on the bus to Vittoriosa was more enjoyable.  We stopped briefly to look at a small section of the Cotonnera fortifications.  This massive project was planned to completely surround the three cities (see my earlier post) but was such a huge undertaking that it was left unfinished after ten years when the funds ran out and new grand masters came into power with further grandiose ideas that required funding.

The chapel here was dedicated to St Catherine of Italy, another woman martyred, this time by having her head cut off.  The porch of the chapel is identical to the chapel in Valletta where I have been going to the lunchtime chamber music concerts and the design is attributed to the same architect who was involved in the 1713-14 reconstruction of that chapel, Romano Carapecchia.  The painting by Mathew Preti that has been restored and will be remounted behind the altar in the Valletta chapel shows St Catherine kneeling and bound but looking ecstatically skyward as the executioner puts his hand on the hilt of his sword and looks questioningly at the viewer for the signal to proceed.  It is this questioning glance that turns the painting into a startling work of art for me.

But our visit to the Cotonnera lines was brief and we all piled back on the bus to go the short distance down to the Maritime museum that I had visited on the previous day.  Coffee had been prepared for us in a large room across the hall from the museum and was ladled out to us from a large pot.  It was only afterwards, when we had gone into the museum and were listening to an excellent presentation from a young man who was very knowledgeable about life at sea at that time, that I discovered that the coffee was actually made in the style of coffee at sea in 17C with cinnamon sticks and cloves added.  

Where the knights built the fortifications as their shield, the navy was their sword.  They did not need to use a press gang in Malta as recruitment to serve in the navy was entirely voluntary with the promise of good food, good pay, a pension and good training at the University of Malta set up for the purpose of preparing seamen.  Many of the models exhibited in the museum were used in the university for training purposes.  

Another interesting exhibit shows artefacts gleaned from excavation of a small area of the seabed that gives a sense of what sailors were eating, drinking and doing with their spare time 300 years ago.  Apart from seeds, stones and bones that demonstrate the good diet, there was also a collection of pipe bowls made in Malta, North Africa and Sicily that were used for smoking tobacco and cannabis, and several dice made of bone.  Gambling was illegal in the navy but the evidence demonstrates that it was popular and the sea was a ready unit for disposal of the evidence.

The painting of the Madonna of the Fleet by Antonella Ricci done in 1575 is reputed to be an ex voto from the Battle of Lepanto.  Sometimes knights would pray to a saint in the heat of battle and promise a work of art if they survive.  This particular offering shows the Knights fleet with angels backing their ships, opposing the Ottoman vessels with devils at their backs!  But Saint Barbara was the martyr most favoured by the knights' navy.  Like St Agatha and St Catherine, St Barbara also died horribly, but the man who cut off her head got his come-uppance by being struck by lightening so sailors pray to St Barbara during storms at sea.

The young man who gave such an excellent presentation at the Maritime museum will be giving a lecture there on friday this week so I will go and learn some more about the fascinating maritime history of Malta.

We were dropped back at Valletta at the end of the tour and I decided I needed some reflection time so went and ate my biscuits and cheese for lunch at Argotti gardens - the university's botanic gardens - another public park on the top of ramparts in Floriana.  I wanted to stay in Valletta until 5.00pm when there was a performance of Maltese composers at Teatru Manoel.  It started raining in the afternoon and it was a new experience for me wandering through almost deserted, rain-washed streets to the theatre.  The compere for the show was also the main composer featured by the Crossbreed ensemble, Ruben Zahra.  One of his pieces featured the Maltese bagpipe made from local bamboo attached to a cows horn with the mouthpiece inserted into the neck of a goatskin with tasseled legs.  The piece also included a friction drum that is played by rubbing the bamboo inserted into the drum rather than by striking the skin.  The concert, held in Sala Isouard of the beautiful old theatre, was challenging but certainly held my attention.

I finished a very full-on day with lampuki and vegetables in one of the seafood restaurants along the front at my hometown of Marsaxlokk!

Birgu by candlelight

My weekend has been full!  I have so many photos it will be difficult to sort out which ones to use here.  

I caught the bus up to Valletta around midday on Saturday and checked into the Hotel Castille which is next to the Barrakka gardens on the corner of Merchant street.  Then I decided to walk around the harbour to Vittoriosa for the candlelit evening.  I set off along the battlements leading through Floriana.  I am beginning to love how the huge fortifications set up by the knights are now being re-cycled for public use as parks and gardens.  Malta's historic past is complex and fascinating and is a rich resource to draw on.  I am glad that that heritage is being used to make life more pleasant for the people who live here rather than as a theme park for tourists only.  

After Floriana, the walk becomes less pleasant.  It is difficult to find a way along the harbour side through the commercial dock areas of Marsa and the through roads are busy with traffic.  I wandered through some decaying dockside areas with the Back Again bar closed but probably open at other times and the Pipefitters Workshop Number 1 in the old customs shed also closed.  I had to backtrack from there to find a way past the dockyards that are currently under threat with great loss of jobs and will be privatised as soon as the conditions of tender can be worked out with EU.

Back on the main road, I walked up a hill past a large technical school and the mosque.  Down from the roundabout with a turn-off to the three cities, I found a bakery where I got two cheese pastizzi for lunch and walked along munching.

The three cities are Vittoriosa, Cospicua and Senglea.  Their ancient names are Birgu, Bormla and Isla.  Isla and Birgu are on two peninsulas reaching out into the harbour whilst Bormla (Cospicua) links the two together at the head of the creek that separates them.  I didn't go into Isla (Senglea) this time but have made a note to explore there soon.  The approach to Birgu is past the massive dockyard sheds and through a tunnel that runs through the ancient fortifications.  As I approached Birgu, all the white and red flags announced that this was the place!

By this time it was well into the afternoon and I was hot so I found my way down to the marina, past the Maritime museum and had a Cisk lager in one of the waterfront cafes.  This area has been gentrified and there are some massive yachts moored stern in along the promenade.  After walking along and taking the classic watch turret photo that is a worldwide icon, I found my way up into the narrow streets of the city where there was a feeling of expectation as people prepared their houses and streets for the evening.  The banners were already up in the main square but the candles that lined many of the streets on the pavements and in window niches were being put out as I strolled.  There were also people in costume gathering in corners and spaces around various places.

I found the Malta at War museum, the Monastery and then the Inquisitors palace and went round a photography exhibition at the first, the display of banners that they were still putting up at the second and the rooms and cells of the latter.  It seems that the Knights were not so nasty to witches and prostitutes and dissenters as they were in other parts of the world and women who dabbled in incantations and spells outside of the religious boundaries were seldom tortured but were detained in prison or released on good behaviour bonds.  As I came out of the Inquisitors palace, night had fallen and there was a drum band beating their way through the street so I followed them into the square which by now was thronged with people.

I did a turn of the square to check out the foodstalls and wine booths that were doing a roaring trade around the sides of the square and eventually decided on rabbit and chips for dinner.  All the tables set up in the middle of the square were full so I perched myself on the low wall surrounding one of the monuments that adorn every square and many of the streets in Malta.  Nothing was happening on the large stage area that had been set up, but the drummers continued drumming in the centre of the square and my chosen spot was great for people watching.

After a while I decided to wander down to the Maritime Museum on my way to get a motorised dhaigsa across Grand Harbour and back to Valletta.  I will talk about the Maritime Museum that I visited again on Sunday in my next post.  

Dhaigsas are traditional Maltese boats that used to be operated with the boatman standing up, facing forward to work the oars.  Now they have a small outboard motor fitted and the oars are used only for manoevering in and out of the jetty.  I shared the dhaigsa with a young Maltese couple who quickly identified that the oarsman was, in fact, English and had been written up in the local paper because he had lovingly restored four dhaigsas.  He hadn't planned to work that evening but had been called out by one of his regular clients and so got caught up in the busy traffic across the harbour.  He talked about living in Senglea and how he loved the harbour and the feeling of community that was very strong in his street and around his local church square.  He has lived in Malta for fifteen years and is working on his fifth restoration.

I was tired when I got back to the hotel after negotiating the steep streets up from the fishmarket where the dhaigsa dropped us off.  But it took me a while to get to sleep.  My hotel room was spacious with an enormous bed, but the bed was too soft and it sounded like all the plumbing in the converted palace came down through the airconditioning duct past my room!  My head was also buzzing with all the experiences of the day.  In my next post I'll tell the story of Sunday when I went with Heritage Malta to hear about the Cottonera fortifications.

Cooking with capers

The pace of life is quickening here since my last post.  I went up to the architecture seminar and found that the presenter was the same as the short story writer - Oliver Friggieri - but sadly for me he was speaking in Malti so I had to leave.  I must learn some language!  

I have started learning lace-making and went to my first class at the local council office on Wednesday.  I now have my pillow, bobbins, pins, thread and the basic pattern set up on the lounge so that I can do my practice of the base stitch before next Wednesday's lesson.  I have also got my laptop set up at home now after a lot of phone calls and visits to the Valletta office of the service provider so when I called a friend in Australia on my Skype this morning and told him I was learning lace-making, he suggested I should learn a musical instrument so I can play when I go back to Australia!  So another distraction from my writing which needs to become my central focus!

I've also learnt one of the secrets of Maltese cooking is the use of capers.  My brother first observed how people collect capers along the sides of the roads here when the season is right and I noticed jars of capers in the Marsaxlokk market and bought a coffee jar full.  Now I throw a spoonful into everything - spaghetti sauce, fried rice, zuchini stuffing - and it gives everything an interesting flavour.

Apart from my regular trip to Valletta on Thursday for the Chamber Music concert at St Catherine of Italy - German baroque for flute and harpsichord - I also went up again on Friday to a conference organised by SKOP, a local NGO, about the Millenium development goals.  The focus was on the eradication of poverty worldwide, but a major issue for Malta is responding to the many refugees from sub-Saharan Africa who make the perilous journey through the desert to Libya, where they often stay for several years, and then by leaky boat to Malta.  I began to think about how I might best use my energy and resources in this last phase of my life to enable some continuity in building a world where children no longer die in poverty.

Today I'm going back up to Valletta and will go across to one of the three cities that surround Grand Harbour, Vittoriosa.  The picture that heads this post is a view across the harbor from Valletta.  This evening they are holding Birgu by candlelight when everyone puts candles in their houses and on the streets and there are various historic re-enactments.  I have booked into a hotel in Valletta for the night because I'm not sure how the buses will be running and then tomorrow morning I'm going on a tour of the Cottonera fortifications organised by Heritage Malta.  So that will be my next post

Scarlatti and armour

I'm spending a lot of time on the bus to Valletta or waiting for it to arrive!  Yesterday three buses sailed past before the right one turned up and stopped for me.  

But I discovered some more about the capital city of Malta.  I went up for an 11 am concert at St Catherine's of Italy where I have been going each Sunday and Thursday for their chamber music concerts to raise awareness and funds for the chapel's restoration.  You can see St Catherine's in the photo that heads up this post.  It is behind the outdoor stage that was set up for Notte Bianca in the bombed out opera house.  This time at St Catherine's they were starting a series focusing on Scarlatti and his contemporaries and the young soprano who fronted the two violins and harpsichord was superb.  

The chapel is situated behind the bombed opera house at the entrance gate to Valletta so it is in a significant position, particularly in the light of the amazing millenium project space that is located at St James Cavalier across the road.  I stumbled on this creative arts centre by accident yesterday afternoon.  The main entrance is from the square where the government offices are located (you can see one side of the government building in the photo above to the right of St Catherine's) but there are also points of access onto the street where the opera house crumbles.  The original building was some kind of defensive tower that was then used to house two huge water tanks.  At different times of occupation it was then used for other things including an officers' mess and a NAAFI.  But the most recent re-cycling is the most stunning in terms of opening up the space.  The two massive tank spaces have become a theatre where movies are shown and an atrium where sculpture exhibits are put on at different levels down the spiral walkway around the space.  There is also a large, vaulted gallery exhibition space and a smaller installation space where the current exhibition is about multiculturalism and the five senses using interactive installations.  I particularly liked the room where a large table is set up for dinner and the viewer is invited to sit down and become part of the various feasts from around the world that are projected from above onto the table.  I sat down with some Scandinavian tourists and a Maltese woman with her little daughter and laughed as arms passed dishes round the table and presented me with delicacies.

It was complete chance that I investigated that amazing space on my way back to the bus terminus from lunch at the 3 Baronnes cafe.  I had been down to try and get pastizzi cheesecakes for lunch at my favourite hole in the wall bakery down Republic street but found that it was closed on a Sunday so I called in to the Armoury and got one of the audiotours that seem to be the standard tourist accompaniment for many of the amazing sites now available in Malta. The Armoury is another stunning collection of artefacts, this time of weapons and armour since the time of the knights.  The audiotape is interesting and helpful but is so extensive (you can press at least 90 numbers) and there are only a few numbers located in the numerous cases that the listener gives up on trying to keep track of the bombardment of pikes, styles of armour through the ages, canon, swords and various types of guns.  Once again there were the huge tapestries in the State rooms but little description that I could locate.  The theme here seemed to be the battle between the knights and the Turks.

I'm being tempted by one of the delicious cakes on display in the cabinet next to me so will add a photo and sign off.  This afternoon I'm going up to Valletta again to hear a lecture from an architect who has the same surname, Frigiettera, that I have found on a collection of short stories from the library.

Valletta again

Still waiting for my telephone connection and this morning we had an electricity failure so I couldn't finish my laundry.  But I'm learning to go with the moment in spite of technological difficulties!  I'm in the waterfront cafe again which is becoming one of my haunts.

Yesterday I went up to Valletta again on the bus.  On the way to the bus stop I called in to the local library and actually struck an opening hour.  Th library consists of a room in the local school with half the space devoted to kid's books and the other half to popular adult literature but I found a few of the English language fiction books based in Malta on the shelfs as well as a great history section that the librarian introduced me to.  I now have the opening hours up on my fridge along with the postcard from Norway that Carol sent me last week and the passport photos that they did for me when I went for my Malta ID card.

The Viola concert at St Catherine's of Italy church was mostly Bach.  My cultural exposure in Malta will be especially about Baroque architecture and classical music!  The organiser of the concert series was also the soloist.  She was excellent and explained how although our small donation of 5 euros would not go far in restoring the Pretti influenced painting on the central dome, the concerts were raising awareness about the church and so business interests were becoming interested in sponsoring the important restoration work.

Before the concert, I dropped in for coffee at the cafe Baronne underneath Barrakka gardens and caught the hourly firing of the canon.  The photo a few posts further on shows the battery.  After the concert, I strolled down Merchant street to the headquarters of Malta Heritage where I am now a member and bought a ticket to go on a tour of the Cotonerra fortifications a week on Sunday.  Cotonerra (not sure if that is how you spell his name - must check) was one of the Grand masters whose name keeps cropping up in connection with the fortifications particularly around Birgu, one of the three cities adjacent to Valletta where I will be going to the candlelit evening a week on Saturday.

I missed the box office opening hours at Manoel theatre where I was hoping to find out about an up-coming concert called La Serena with a visiting Portuguese soprano and a small ensemble.  But I decided that I would visit St John's co-cathedral and museum that Carol and I had arrived too late for when she was here.  The sheer profusion of Baroque embellishment is overwhelming let alone the Flemish tapestries and the Caravaggio painting of the beheading of St John.  I have 12 postcards to send to friends and family over the next few weeks!  It will take me longer to think through the amazing gilded stonework, marble tomb flagstones that cover the floor and over-the-top baroque statues in the chapels.  Malta's position as a meeting point, and sometimes collision point, of all the cultures of the Mediterranean keeps on confronting me.

I've succumbed to a fruit tart and so will add a photo and post.

Bones and snails

Today I've got two cheese pastizzi for lunch so I can do another blog in my waterfront cafe.  This morning I rode my bike over to Birzebbuga, the next fishing village to Marsaxlokk.  It is now developed as a freeport but has a pleasant waterfront and I wanted to see if I could find Ghar Dalem and the neolithic site.  I missed it going through, but on the way back I took a different road and found some signs.  People kept saying "Just go straight" but straight seemed to go on for ages.  Eventually I saw the temple sign which is a bit like stonehenge.

The track to the temple has been christianised.  At the start of the walking track where I left my bike there is a small garden with grottos and candles.  Very peaceful and there are benches for sitting as well as signs requesting that you refrain from picking flowers.  There has been rain recently and the rocky track up to the site was wet in places.  As I got to the top of the hill, there were more crosses and a man on a rocky slope was collecting snails which seem to climb up any vegetation they can find after rain.  I have noticed that several of the vegetable shops are selling live snails at the moment.  There were no signs and I walked on round the track until I came to an enclosed field that was greened up with grass and small wildflowers after the rain.  But I couldn't see any neolithic temples - just a junk metal yard across the fields of the valley.  As I turned around the field to come back, I realised that the rocky slope where the man was collecting snails was actually the temple and I could see some large stones placed inside an enclosing rubble wall but when went to walk up towards it, the man spoke to me in Malti and indicated that I couldn't go in.  I'm not quite sure what he said but it was something to do with the day or the time.  So I went back down the path enjoying the feeling that I had found it.

Back on my bike, I carried on up a major hill out of Birzebbuga and found Ghar Dalem caves.  This site has become well established as a place to visit and I was able to use my Malta Heritage membership to get in free (it usually costs 7 Euros).  The caves were formed out of the soft sandstone in ancient times and then during the ice age when Malta was ice free but very wet, a river crashed into the cave system and deposited it's load including the bones of elephant, hippos, deer, bears and wolves.  Malta was linked to Sicily at this time as the levels of the sea fluctuated with the ice age changes so the animals found were similar to those found in Sicily and Europe in general but had gone through a process of miniaturisation for the elephants and hippos or gigantism for some lizards.

The river eventually worked it's way into the valley leaving the caves dry so that they then developed later layers of human artifacts including pottery.  The caves themselves are interesting and after the recent rain, I could see stalagmites and stalactites in formation, but the museum itself is also fascinating in terms of the way in which it has developed over the years since the caves were first excavated in 1865.  In the old museum there are large cases covering the walls with row upon row of neatly wired up elephant teeth, hippo molars and other bones.  The new museum has a display that gives more general information about the formation of the caves and the history of the men who excavated and were curators of the museum.  The first curator looks more like a theatre entrepreneur and was vain enough to carve his initials into the cave as he excavated.  The second curator is the person who laid out the incredible display of bones in the old museum.

Tomorrow I'll go up to Valletta again for a lunch time concert in St Catherine's but I'm hoping to post a blog about the trip down through Italy soon.  The picture at the top of this post is of the entrance to Hasan's cave which I discovered today is the other end of part of the second cave formation that is associated with Ghar Dalem.

Marsaxlokk and Valletta

The picture is of my saint on the corner of my street in Marsaxlokk.  I now have a Malta ID card and a Malta Heritage membership card so I feel more and more each day like I belong!  Today was recycling day and I just managed to catch the truck as it came down our street.  Then I rode my bike over to Tarxien to see how long it will take when I go over there to visit the temples.

Notte Bianco on Saturday in Valletta was a good way to get an idea of the various venues around the capital.  The event has been held each year for three years.  The streets are decorated with the parish church banners and all the churches are dressed up with all their saint statues.  The people of Valletta throng the streets and sit in the churches praying.  They are joined by locals from all over the island as well as tourists.  Public transport busses keep running until late so I was able to get back to Marsaxlokk after enjoying a wander through the streets and a browse through several of the sites that were open free of charge.  I went round the museum of archaeology to find out about the temples, the General Workers Union building to find out about the history of trades unions in Malta (GWU started the same year that I was born) and the Manoel theatre.  There were also performances in the streets and art exhibitions.  I now have a map of all the arts venues and on Sunday went up again to Valletta for a harpsichord concert in St Catherine's of Italy church and to the Mediterranean Conference centre to go round their exhibition of the hospital of the Knights of St John as well as the concert, Voices, which is a bi-annual offering for charity by a 120 voice choir of volunteers along with a band and soloists.

Will add a photo and publish because I have spun out my cappucino too long!

On blogs and the passing of time

Mornings at the board room of the local Marsaxlokk council offices is becoming one of my routines.  There is free wi-fi here and they also use the room for craft classes so yesterday I signed up to learn bobbin lace-making in a new class starting in two weeks.

Another of my routines is daily shopping for fresh bread, fish and vegetables and usually a walk or bike ride on the pot-holed country roads that criss-cross the small fields with their dry-stone walls.

I am still waiting for internet access at home but there is a problem with the phone line into my flat.  I am using this as an excuse not to get into a writing routine!  I have just re-read some of my old blogs to try and organise my thoughts for posting the stories I have missed out so far.  It is curious how this form of writing confronts me with the collision between immediacy and planning.  It is startling to read my stories as my plans play out in experience.  And when experiences are coming thick and fast, there is no time for the reflection that is the basis of writing, so past, present and future start jumbling up together. 

Yesterday I went up to Valletta to get a Maltese ID card.  It seems that I need this in order to get grey re-cycling bags from the local council.  I eventually found the right office down at the end of the main road through Valletta.  Just found out I need to post and get off so the cleaner can come in.  Will continue this afternoon.

Didn't make it back in the afternoon as I got into flat-cleaning mode preparatory for my first venture into entertaining planned for lunch today.  I tried again this morning but the council connection was down so now I've come to a cafe on the front where I have discovered they have free wi-fi.  There are traditional luzzus bobbing on their moorings across the road and wireless with coffee!

Lunch was to thank the couple in the flat below me who have been very helpful as I find out about the local way of life.  I made stuffed round zuchinis using a recipe suggested by a woman buying vegetables from the cart up by the public library.  The cart is there everyday, all day.  The public library, located in the local school is only open for two hours a day and I haven't been lucky enough to strike one of the open hours yet.  But I still have plenty of reading matter accumulated from my travels.

The couple are from Devon and have bought the flat below me a few years ago.  They are my age but their commitments in England prevent them staying here as long as they would like.  They go back tomorrow and will be away for the month of October.  I am glad that my neighbours are thoughtful people as the style of living here in Malta is very crowded and everyone has to work on enabling privacy for each other.  But they have already built up a network of friends amongst the local people and have given me lots of useful information about how things work.

Yesterday I bought my mobile phone to use for local calls and I have succeeded in making my first phone call to my cousin who lives in Sliema in the winter and St Paul's bay in the summer.  Doris remembers coming to visit us and playing with me when I was a child in St Paul's bay but I can't remember her.  We are going to meet up for coffee in Sliema tomorrow morning.  She is going to wear a white dress with a red handbag!

I'll go on from Sliema to Valletta for Nocce Bianca which they are holding there in the evening.  There are performances and exhibitions happening all round the city and most of the heritage sites are staying open with free access.  I will write about it in my next post