This is our second piece about boats in as many days, but with Malta sweltering right now, all thoughts turn to water. Having been stuck in the 1pm rush hour from Valletta today, with my son singing ‘Mad Dogs and Englishmen Go out in the Midday Sun’ behind me, I can tell you I was pleased to get this cool news when I got home and checked mail…

Malta Jazz Festival Cruises
I can think of fewer better ways to spend a sultry July night in Malta than listening to some world-class jazz with a cool breeze from sea enveloping me. If that appeals to you too, then listen up, because booking’s just opened for a places on a Turkish Gulet, the Hera, which is running Malta Jazz Festival (15,16,17 July) evening cruises of Grand Harbour with a buffet included.

Those veteran Jazz Festival goers among us will have seen the boats anchor up each year for one of the most memorable seats in town. The Hera is a sponsor of the festival, so has its rightful place among the craft that are bound to jostle along the wharf near us landlubbers and the stage. Even if you’re not on board, the yachts bobbing nearby make the setting uniquely Malta Jazz.

Booking Details
Tickets are €50. The package includes a 45-minute cruise of Grand Harbour taking in the sunset, and a cold buffet and welcome drink.

Departure from Sliema Ferries opposite Burger King/ Nazzarenu Church.

Time 8.00pm – 11.30pm
Price €50 per night
Transport included.

For further details, e-mail:
info@heracruises.com or call +356 21330583/ 21347483

To book, call 79445448

First, there’s the boat – the MS Hulda, built in 1905. And then aboard it is a travelling exhibition of scientific sculptures by the Turkish-Swedish artist Ilhan Koman (1921 – 1986). The Hulda is now birthed at Grand Harbour Marina, Birgu (3 – 13 July) as part of the Malta Arts Festival. And it’s running some some great, hands-on workshops for kids, for free. But what is Hulda all about and why is it in Malta?

What is Hulda?
The Hulda Festival features events celebrating the meeting of arts and sciences around Hulda and Koman. The Festival kicked off in March 2009 and will draw to a close in November 2010, by which time the Festival aboard ship will have visited Stockholm, Amsterdam, Antwerp, Bordeaux, Lisbon, Barcelona, Naples, Malta, Thessalonica and Istanbul. The festival benefits from the active partnership of some of the most prestigious art or science institutions based in these 10 cities.

Ilhan Koman’s creativity combined arts with sciences, make him a representative of a universal approach that descends from Leonardo da Vinci. For the Hulda Festival, Koman’s artworks embark aboard Hulda, the boat that was his residence and workshop. Visitors are welcome to play with the artists’ most interesting pieces to get feel for their scientific properties and artistic qualities.

Workshops for Children
In parallel, ten different workshops have been conceptualised for children by a local organisation in each of the Hulda’s pit stops. The workshops bring artistic and scientific disciplines together to make them more interesting and playful through topics such as “Sculpture & Aerodynamics”, “Creating the Nautical Charts of the Middle-Ages” and “Art and Alternative Energies”. In Malta, the Art and Science Youth workshops are organised by Il-Kunsill Malti għax-Xjenza u t-Teknoloġija (Malta Council for Science and Technology) : 3 – 13 July 2010 – Hulda Tent.

Booking & Info
Workshops will be open to a maximum of 25-30 children each session. You will need to pre-book. For more information please contact Martina Castillo at martina.castillo@gov.mt or give her a call on 23602122.

Background on the Hulda Festival project, which ends in Istanbul to celebrate its year as a European City of Culture.

It’s a Sunday evening in early July as I write this, which is an appropriate moment to tackle that great Maltese seasonal institution – a large, loud gathering of family and friends out for a beach BBQ.

Tomorrow morning, many a Maltese beach will bear the signs of this weekend’s nighttime invasion – litter, spent charcoal, chicken wings and detritus of all kinds will be left behind. While some litter, there are others who spend hours doing voluntary beach tidy-ups. It’s a never ending cycle of litter, tidy, litter… but perhaps we’ve reached the tipping point, or nearly.

The Beach BBQ’s Environmental Impact
Of course, it’s not solely the beach BBQ that contributes to beach littering, but here’s an anecdote on its polluting effect which isn’t all about litter.

A couple of hot July’s ago, I went out for an expensive, splash-out meal at a restaurant right next to a small bay. The establishment suggests guests arrive to catch the sunset views from the al fresco dining area. We did. And that was about the best bit of the evening, and the meal. I won’t do a hatchet job on the meal (which it deserved), but the evocative sundown drink was spoiled within around five minutes of our arrival by the chugging into action of a generator and the waft of petrol, followed by floodlights, shouting and general mayhem. The beach BBQ was in full swing.

Now, I like the idea of a beach BBQ, and went on a couple in the past. But we were responsible enough to keep noise to a minimum. The people I was with enjoyed chilling out in the mellow heat and listening to the waves, not music or generators and scoured their patch of beach meticulously using torches to ensure not a scrap of litter was left. If all nighttime BBQ-goers did this, then there’d be no need to…

Ban the Beach BBQ
Mellieha Local Council used by-laws to ban the BBQ last summer from Ghadira Bay, to some uproar. Some quarters saw it as another attack on popular ‘cultural’ pastimes. Not that the beach BBQ can be compared with the Ghanafest.

Ghadira Bay has a nature reserve behind it and is aiming for Blue Flag status as a beach with outstanding environmental and safety credentials. While the Blue Flag criteria don’t stipulate a ban on BBQs, Blue Flag status and barbecuing don’t sit happily together; the pollution the beach BBQ produces in Malta would make attaining and retaining Blue Flag status nearly impossible.

Two beaches in Malta now have the Blue Flag – Bugibba (this year) and St George’s Bay (awarded last year). Interestingly, both are ‘new’, man-made beaches and in built-up areas popular with tourists. They have no local tradition of BBQs.

Yet, the more rural, beauty spot beaches, which should have greater potential to reach Blue Flag standards aren’t yet quality enough; the BBQ culture must have something to do with that.

Conspicously, today, I noticed a row of temporary info boards on Golden Bay beach explaining Blue Flag and the local sealife and fauna and flora. The Malta Tourism Authority’s info boards nearby, also a new addition this year, clearly said BBQs were not allowed, neither was camping.

So, plans are afoot to make more of Malta’s beaches BBQ free in pursuit of that elusive Blue Flag status no doubt. I love the idea of footloose and fancy-free summer nights on the beach with a Barbie as much as the next man. But given our islands’ limited beach space, masses of beach goers and our enduring lack of self-discipline, the BBQ must stay at home. About time.

The public holiday known as ‘L’Imnajra’ that falls on 29 June, has to be one of Malta’s most obscure in origin and defies neat description. In the religious calendar, the day marks the Feast of Saints Peter and Paul, but this Maltese celebration, which starts on the night of 28 June and carries on all the next day into evening, is probably less to do with religion and more about rural life, country past-times and folk music.

It’s a bit of a medley really. It’s also associated with one place only in Malta, as people flock to celebrate it in Buskett Gardens that lie between Rabat and Dingli. It’s a family affair with people taking picnics and tents to spend a night out under the small pines which make up Malta’s largest stretch of woodland, planted by the Knights as a hunting grounds.

The feast has roots dating back well before the time of the Knights in Malta. ‘L’Imnajra’ is the Maltese corruption of the Italian word ‘Luminara’ meaning festival of light. The feast’s celebrations were once marked by bonfires lit in Mdina and Rabat, so folklore has it.

What to Expect
The night is characterised by general merry-making and its sociable atmosphere, with people bringing along instruments and making music. Local folk and ethnic-inspired bands usually turn up to play and set the scene. Families have BBQs and picnics and kids romp around. Traditionally, people take rabbit (Fenek) stew to eat. It’s a Maltese national dish and there’s even a Maltese word for ‘going out to eat rabbit’ – Fenkata! Some families and groups of friends make a complete summer night of L’Imarja and camp out.

The following day sees more organised rural pursuits: there is an agricultural show, which gets larger each year (seems to be a trend in Malta recently) as well as traditional bare-back horse and donkey races on Saqqajja Hill below Mdina. So expect some traffic chaos and roads blocked around that area.

Visitor Value
If you want to see some real Malta, then this could be worth a visit. It’s not the sheer exuberance of a village feast, as it’s more a summer folklore and farming affair. But it does have a certain appeal and charm. You will need to bus it there (Bus 81 from Valletta seems the best bet). Take some food and drink, get stuck in, and go with the flow. This is an impromptu affair in some ways, where people make their own fun.

Photo: John Haslam

Take a walk through Valletta’s back streets, and you’ll come across old shop fronts with wonderful names, often faded or peeling with the patina of the years. Most are shuttered up relics of once busy shops. Some sport the names of the partners in the family firms while others prefix their wares or services with adjectives we’d rarely see in adverts today, such as ‘economical’ or ‘bespoke’. These shop fronts are the signs of Valletta of old, the ‘Vanishing Valletta’ documented by Maltese photographer David Pisani.

Not many of these old shops that were once the lifeblood of Valletta a century or more ago live on today. But one family of retailers can trace its history back that far; its story parallels that of Malta through World Wars, slumps and booms. It can document also consumers’ changing tastes in fashion and furnishings from Victoriana to 1930s’ modernism and 1950s’ post-war utility and beyond.

The firm, now run by the grandsons and great grandchildren of the founding brothers, is Camilleri Paris Mode, and it’s just turned 120. Once called ‘À La Ville de Lyon’, and located on the corner of Merchants Street and St John’s Square tucked next to the Co-Cathedral, it stocked general drapery and advertised that is was a “naval & military contractor”. According to an old newspaper cutting, its wares included “silks, woolen, cotton, linen goods, damask, tapestry, the latest novelties, and faldettas” (the traditional hooded cloak women wore in Malta and Gozo, known also as the għonnella).

The business witnessed its ups and downs and the story of the Camilleri family mirrors that of Malta. It grasped the market in the Fin de siècle era when it imported the lastest in Parisian fashion accessories to adorn Malta’s well-heeled society ladies, as well as ensuring wisely that it offered value and service to all strata of clientele; it saw a brother almost emigrate to Argentina; it saw the family business split and diverge; it had hard times following the First World War; and it saw its premises and the city around it all but destroyed by World War II.

As it celebrates 120 years in trade, Camilleri Paris Mode – its name still resonating with its history as a purveyor of Paris fashions – is no longer solely about fabrics. The firm’s now three shops, one still on Merchants’ Street, offer also wedding services (lists, gowns and accessories), design and manufacture of sofas, wines and delicacies, and lifestyle and living ranges suited to every interior from baroque palaces to marina penthouses.

Its nerve centre is thoroughly contemporary and housed in spanking new premises in Rabat. But appearances deceive. If there are two adjectives that describe CPM (as those in the know call it) today, just as 120 years ago, I’d say they are ‘bespoke’ and ‘fine’. Whether you’re calling in to get a single bottle of wine or talking about the interior of an entire flat, the family and its family of staff give you the kind of old-world service that you thought went out, well, a hundred years ago. It survived, when many shut up shop around it. There’s a lesson in that somewhere…

Photo: Rubelli Fabrics, courtesy of Camilleri Paris Mode.

“I always try to find the perfect balance between artists who are big crowd-pullers and others who are more challenging to the ear. It is also my role to expose the Maltese audiences to what’s happening on the jazz scene today. The jazz festival is not just a social event where people gather to drink beer – it is a wonderful opportunity to discover new artists who are creating new exciting music,” says Sandro Zerafa, Malta Jazz’s Artistic Director, and a professional jazz musician himself.

Sandro took over the role for last year’s festival and has had the job of reviving it musically and bringing it back to its jazz roots and its favoured venue of Ta’ Liesse, below Valletta alongside Grand Harbour. Its success last year once again as a pure Jazz festival shows that the Islands can cater to a jazz-inclined crowd.

That said, contrast is the keyword at Malta Jazz 2010 (15,16,17 July), the 20th edition of the festival. This year’s line-up offers a panorama of the contemporary jazz scene, with all its diversity, from u-jazz to fusion, from vocal jazz to world music. Once more, Malta Jazz Festival features the cream of today’s jazz scene, presenting a star-studded line-up and offering a palette of artists catering for both the layman and the seasoned jazz enthusiast.

The Programme
This year’s edition highlights include rising star bass-player and vocalist Esperanza Spalding (clip below) and nu-jazz act The Bad Plus. Esperanza’s own brand of fusion has been headlining jazz festivals around the globe for the past few years and the Malta Jazz Festival this year is proud to present her unique blend of groove, vocal and post-bop jazz. The Bad Plus is one of the most original and influential jazz outfits to have emerged in recent years – a postmodern power jazz trio, notorious for their quirky renditions of Nirvana, Pink Floyd, Black Sabbath, David Bowie and Aphex Twin.

The 2010 edition places a particular emphasis on fusion music, with the inclusion of guitar hero Grammy award nominee Mike Stern, (featuring two other familiar names with the Maltese jazz crowd – Randy Brecker and Dave Weckl) and Cameroonian singer/songwriter/virtuoso bass player Richard Bona, a past collaborator of Pat Metheny and the late Joe Zawinul.

Cutting-edge jazz, featuring New York’s finest, is represented by Ari Hoenig, one of the most happening musicians in New Yorkʼs club scene today. The 2010 edition of the Malta Jazz Festival features also two of the most important drummers in the contemporary jazz world – Bill Stewart and Greg Hutchinson, who will be playing with one of the festival’s headliners, saxophone player Joshua Redman.

The local jazz scene will be be represented by Francesca Galea, an up-and-coming vocal talent who will be accompanied by Brazilian pianist Leonardo Montana, and drummer Charles Gatt, the jazz festivalʼs creator, who will be leading his own quartet with Malta’s own Joe Debono on piano, and two familiar names from the Parisian jazz scene – Amy Gamlen on saxophone and Matteo Bortone on bass.

Tickets
Already on sale – at Euros 30 for the three nights, they’re a real steal.

More info
See: Malta Jazz Festival Official Blog for comment and latest.
Also, Malta Jazz Festival site
Malta Jazz on Twitter

And finally, to celebrate 20 Years of Malta Jazz
To mark the festival’s 20th anniversary a commemorative book featuring photography by Pierre Stafrace, Darrin Zammit Lupi, Joe Smith and Patrick Fenech will be published. Details to come.

This title of this guest post speaks for itself. Malta of old, perhaps even today, is brim full of stories, folklore, legends, superstition, tradition and ritual.

Evarist Bartolo, Shadow Minister for Education and a lecturer in communications at the University of Malta, writes what seems a short story. But one can’t help wonder that some strange truth lies behind the episode he relates.

As a child, I lived with my grandmother and aunt near the sanctuary in Mellieha in one of the row of troglodyte houses with the bedroom and the kitchen in caves. Only the sitting room was constructed at the mouth of the cave and provided the simple façade of the house.

The devils were all around me as a child. Our grandmother made sure we knew that. Every summer evening, enjoying the fresh breeze, we all gathered outside on the pavement and street after sunset, and after dozing for 15 minutes through the rosary, I would wake up wide eyed to listen to her telling us what used to happen a long time ago in Mellieha.

At night I used to cover my head with the sheet to try not to see the flickering red light cast across the walls by the slow paraffin cooker on which a coffee pot was put to brew slowly all night for the morning. I was sure that the red light was coming from a crack in the rock and I was even surer that the crack led to hell, deep within the earth and from which any moment a devil might come to take me away.

I had seen the picture of the death of the bad man: a desperate man was looking down to the right corner of the room where he lay dying and a devil was coming out of the ground to take him away. “Because he lived a bad life” my grandmother told me over and over again.

I became even more alarmed when one evening she decided to tell us about the farmhouse that the devils built overnight on the edge of Mellieha: in the valley on your way down to Mellieha Bay the devils had decided to build a farmhouse. They built it in a night with huge blocks of stones. I did not dare ask why the devils had decided to take up farming in Mellieha. I simply decided that there was no way I would walk to that part of the village to check for myself the builders’ craftsdevilship.

I could see the devils working hard at night, cutting the big boulders, carrying them on their shoulders and building the farmhouse. I had no doubts whatsoever that the devils which looked like black and red lizards walking upright on their hind legs, dragging their long tail behind them, were very strong and could do whatever they liked, including building a large farmhouse in a night, after all they regularly dragged millions of sinners to hell where they roasted them and plunged sharp tridents into them.

So I never dared walk to the valley to see this farmhouse. I did not even know where it was exactly. Years later I chanced upon it as a teenager walking with my family when one of my sisters yelled at seeing a huge bale of straw approaching slowly over the hill. She was sure that the wizened old farmer was in fact one of the devils who had built the farmhouse and was now carrying that straw out of the silent farmhouse in the valley. Even that day I kept away from the farmhouse and decided to look at it safely from the other side of the valley.

I could understand perfectly what I read years later in Leonard Mahoney’s ‘5000 Years of Architecture in Malta’: “Superstitious farmers who tilled their lands in the vicinity never dreamt of making a closer acquaintance and so, protected by its name as much as by its solitude, it had stood unmolested for many years.” Is it a hunting lodge or a cow house? What did this building serve for? Who built it? Even Leonard Mahoney fails to answer these questions. “The food troughs (or mangers) are enormous and very high from the floor; evidence, as the local folk point out, that the (devil) owner of this farmhouse kept enormous (devil?) cows.”

He concedes: “But mystery wraps this building. There are no armorial bearings, or inscriptions, or even graffiti …to throw light on its original purpose or use.”

My grandmother might have been right after all and while I look at the solid windowless building on my way to Mellieha Bay I have yet to visit the place and enter it.

Photo: Courtesy of Walter Lo Cascio

One thing tourists may worry about when out and about in a foreign city is whether they will find a public toilet when and where they need one. The Mediterranean isn’t renowned for providing clean, findable public lavatories.

I remember as a child holidaying in France my mother’s preoccupation with making sure we kids ’spent a penny’ before sightseeing for the day. Back then, French public loos were non-existent or at best all you found were scantilly-clad street urinals. We usually had to buy a drink (the last thing you need) in order to use a cafe’s loos. Those were the days before ubiquitous McDonalds.

Our capital Valletta has for years been much the same experience for tourists in need of fast relief. Some less savoury locals caught short seem to have been using various corners of the city – take the stairs from St George’s Square down to the ditch parking and Yellow Garage and you’ll know what I mean. Thankfully this stinky stairwell will be swept away with Renzo Piano’s plans for City Gate.

But for the past month or so, Valletta has had a shining, exemplary public convenience. It stands where a monument to stench once stood, on the corner of Strait Street and Old Theatre Street; the old sign now painted over and complemented by an illuminated international WC symbol. Amazingly, for any building in Valletta, it has wheelchair access (adherence to EU rules no doubt).

A post about a public loo? We wouldn’t bother normally with such a banal subject, but this revamped loo isn’t any old loo. It’s a superloo of the 21st century with a nod in the direction of Valletta’s palatial past. The Grand Masters’ Palace is just a stone’s throw away after all.

The street it’s on, Strait Street, or il-Gut (the Maltese name sounding more appropriate), was famed in British Service days for its music halls and variety clubs – some less salubrious than others. The new Strait Street public toilets are designed in music hall theme. The entrance looks like the foyer of a club – a gentlemen’s club of sorts – or perhaps that of a small theatre. It is graced with heavy red drapes, sports a neon sign reminiscent of Radio City in New York, and is overseen by an attendant dressed in dinner jacket and dicky bow tie.

He wouldn’t pose for the photo unfortunately, but you might have more luck persuading him. He is bound to become a celebrity. Does he wear white satin gloves when squirting pine fresh cleaner we wonder? The whole convenience is such a male-looking preserve, I wonder too if it has nappy changing? Do contribute your user experiences in the comments section.

Visitor info:
Cost: 30c a visit
Location: Corner of Strait St and Old Theatre St, just between the two M&S’s entrances.
Interest score: 9/10
Visitor experience – I didn’t need to ‘go’ so please let us know what music is piped inside the cubicles!

Other gleaming new public loos in Malta: St Paul’s Bay, near the Sirens’ Waterpolo pitch. Cinema-style architecture, but contemporary, not true art deco.

Birgu to the Maltese, and Vittoriosa to others; to my mind the most beautiful and perfectly preserved of the Three Cities which front Grand Harbour. The city was built by the Knights of St John on a peninsula, with proud Fort St Angelo at its tip, during the early- to mid-Sixteenth Century. After the Great Siege (1565) and the building of Valletta (from 1566 onwards) Birgu’s importance diminished and the Knights moved over the water to take up residence in their new purpose-built fortress city defended by huge bastions and star-shaped Fort St Elmo.

Birgu’s ancient auberges and gracious houses stood largely unchanged until the Second World War when the relentless bombing by the Luftwaffe of the Allied Fleet moored in Dockyard Creek did huge damage to this lovely old city. The tall clock tower that once stood in the main square was hit; the Auberge of Italy was flattened and many other buildings were swept away by the air raids of 1942.

So what is left to see of the city that the Knights of St John built?

The massive bastions and ditches which surround the city remain intact and in the quiet streets of the Colacchio where the Knights lived, you are surrounded by buildings representing several hundred years of architectural history.

In Hilda Tabone Street which leads off the main square there are the Auberges of Provence, Auvergne, France and Aragon (the palaces that quartered the various langues of the Knights). These narrow streets are slowly being restored and the ugly metal-framed windows which destroy the symmetry and proportions of the buildings removed.

Some buildings have been restored and used for the good of the community. For example, the Auberge of England is now the public library. The Inquisitor’s Palace is also open to the public. There is the Maritime Museum in the old Bakery on the Waterfront and exhibitions about the Knights. You can visit also the tunnels and shelters near the Main Gate which were dug during the Second World War and are now open to visitors. The museum there recalls the hardships suffered by residents of the Three Cities during the Malta Blitz.

Post-War neglect of the area and the Maltese prejudice against the Three Cities and their inhabitants means that only recently have the beautiful houses been restored and converted.

Birgu Council is encouraging the inhabitants to be proud of their city and organises many cultural activities to draw visitors to the area. Events such as Birgufest, including an evening of Birgu by Candlelight, and the Feasts of St Lawrence and St Dominic attract as many Maltese residents as tourists and allow people to enjoy the feast for the senses that Birgu offers.

It is pleasure to see that every street and alley is decorated by shrubs and flowers in pots and, amazingly, no one steals them as they might in another locality. It adds to the pleasant ambience as you wander the narrow streets. Cafes and restaurants in the main square, on the Waterfront and in quiet shadowy streets encourage one to linger and savour the atmosphere of this historic city. Spend time watching the small ferry boats (dhajjes) departing for their tours of Grand Harbour or ferrying people across to Valletta, and enjoy a coffee by the marina as you gaze across to Senglea or Kalkara on the other side. A timeless view of tranquility.

Photo: courtesy of Leslie Vella

This weekend sees two events ideal for all-round family fun – the Malta International Fireworks Festival, 29-30 April, over Grand Harbour, and on a totally different note, the SPCA (Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals) Spring Fair at Palazzo Parisio, Naxxar on Sunday 2nd May.

We covered last year’s Fireworks’ Festival, here. The write up will give you the info you need on where to watch from, and also a low-down on what to expect. Although last year our correspondent had a few words to say about the long wait between displays. I am sure the technical hitches will have been ironed out this time round – after all, the event is in its 9th year, so practice must have made perfect on how to set the blessed fireworks off!

Festival starts an hour or so after dusk – seemed to be around 9pm last night, soft launch night. If you want pole position, plan well ahead – park a good distance away (Floriana chock a block last night by 8pm). So prepare to walk a bit! More details here.

I’ve been to the last two SPCA Fairs (Spring and the Xmas one held in mid November) with my son who loved them both. The spring fair has plenty to keep kids occupied – small farm set up with ponies, sheep, goats and so on, and animals to pet, like special breed rabbits. You can buy a bucket of mixed fruit and veg to feed some of the animals. Hand washing facilities at the farm section entrance, though take your own wipes as well!

Kids also love the fairground fun, like throw-the-wet-sponge-at -mum stall! And I remember a lucky dip, and sort of coconut shy as well. Highlights include the numerous local crafts’ stall but the homemade cake and preserves stall is the place to head for first as its goodies sell out quickly! You’ll find it upstairs in the ballroom at the end. Very brave of Palazzo P to let masses of us public crowd into its prized rooms. Take in the gardens too – a joy this time of year…

Fair Times: 10.00 – 18.00, Sunday 2nd May. Details on Facebook.

Photo: courtesy Andrew Galea Debono