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.