Easter has been solitary and reflective. The mood was set on Maundy Thursday when I went to the lunchtime concert at St Catherine of Italy - beautiful songs accompanied by piano for the stations of the cross. But the readings in between each piece gave the performance meaning for me. The performers had carefully chosen poems and writing about some of the horrors that we have perpetrated on each other during the past century. In the past week, I have picked up from two different sources the proposition that Malta's history has been about service. In the past it has been the service of other people's power struggles. Malta's independent future now lies in the service of peace. It is a seductive idea for an old woman who has chosen this small central turning point of the Mediterranean as my home.
The Good Friday procession was interrupted by an island-wide power cut. The final station had just passed me in my position at the top of the hill in St Paul's street. The rhythmic creaking of the carrying poles was stopped as the penitents in their light brown robes reached the top and put down their heavy load on the resting stays. When the power went off, there was literally an electric pause as everyone tried to work out what had suddenly happened to plunge us all into darkness. I walked down along the side of the procession to head to my flat to make dinner, but when I realised the power was off I decided I couldn't face the many flights of steps with lift and lights out of action. I wandered through the Valletta streets where people had started to light candles and put on car headlamps to help the procession get moving again. At the restaurants I passed anxious workers standing in the doorways trying to get an idea of how long the cut might last. Of course, they could not cook food. I ended up in upper Valletta in the cafe at St James Cavalier. They were the only place in Valletta to have power, probably because they have their back to Castille where the PM's office is. I went in for seafood risotto washed down with half a bottle of Maltese wine and finished off with hot chocolate.
At 9.30, the power was still off but I was sufficiently fortified to face the climb up to my flat using the tiny torch on my key ring to light the way.
The rest of Easter I have spent getting back into my writing, unpacking the last of my boxes from Australia and setting up my office space with all my reference books around me. On Sunday, I also went to the Adoloratto cemetery to see if I could find the two plots where my grandparents were buried. I had been given two plot numbers by a very helpful government employee suggested by a friend (thanks, Reno) but it was quite difficult to work out where they were. The cemetery is beautiful, set on a hillside with lots of established trees and the amazing baroque tombs and chapels in the private sections. I wandered vaguely, using the sun to head in a Westerly direction which was where the government plots were located as indicated by the numbers that I was carrying scribbled on a piece of paper. After a while I realised that some of the terrace walls had letters on them and then at the back of the cemetery I noticed that the grave sites had multiple marble plaques on each and these seemed to be temporary. The plots had numbers on them and I eventually found my grandparents in the same row, but not side by side. As in most rocky lands with limited space, Malta routinely clears government graves every ten years and places the remains in a charnel. I couldn't identify the charnel house but I will return during office hours and try to find out more about what I can do to commemorate the place where my ancestors are buried.
The photo that heads the post is of an ancient apiary carved into the garigue at Xemxija that I visited with Ramblers Malta in January. The smaller holes are for the bees to store their honey. The larger hole is where the beekeeper went in to collect it. It seems that the more I write, the more I have to write. Now I have lined up for my next posts the venture in Cuba last year, my trips to UK and Liguria in Italy last month and the visit by my brother last week. Until my next post...
3 comments:
Welcome back to writing Jo. You describe that hiatus between the confusion of moving to a new place and the taking up the threads of routine days very well. I loved your poem and the photo that accompanied it.
Hi Jo, I'm posting a second comment here as I loved the photo, and also found the whole post engaging. I’ve seen apiaries in a lot of countries but none as elaborate (or as dangerous for the beekeeper either) as the one in you photo. Honey must have been a very important part of life in the country. Did they make mead, do you know?
The charnel house is, as you say, common in communities with limited space for graves. Venice has the reverse problem to Malta – not rocks but water – and uses the same method. I think it’s a lovely idea, much nicer than being forced to cremate the remains of one’s loved ones, especially if culture or religion does not agree with cremation
Layers on layers! I've just learnt that the apiary at Xemxija was not built in the Roman era but later in the British era using Roman style designs. When they recently put up interpretation signs, they used current information that identified the design as Roman but up-to-the-minute thinking, based on ancient maps that don't show an apiary, is that it is British.
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