The Obscure Rock (Malta Island, Malta)

I had never even heard of the island country of Malta until I met Erin. It lies in the Mediterranean Sea between Italy and Northern Africa, consisting of a series of islands, and is one of Europe’s smallest countries. But what it lacks in size it more than makes up for in history. I’m not usually one to get that excited about something that happened five hundred years ago – I’d much prefer to be affected by something in the present, but the amazing history of this place was unavoidable.

This ‘obscure rock’, as Sultan Soleyman referred to it before he attacked in the 1500’s, has been occupied again and again over the ages. Due to its strategic position between Africa and Europe, and its mid-point location in the Christian versus Muslim wars, the ‘obscure rock’ has been attacked and occupied by anyone who’s ever held stakes in the Mediterranean; Phoenicians, Romans, Moorish, Normans, French, and finally the British, who occupied until the 1960’s.

But the most famous occupants were the Knights of St John, a group of religious soldiers sent by the European countries to fight and die for Christianity. These soldiers were exempt from the civil wars of Europe and served the sole purpose of fighting Islam – kinda like the Nightwatch in ‘Game of Thrones’.  Malta was their base.

The most dramatic of confrontation on Malta was between the Ottomans from the Middle East, who sent 200 ships and 40,000 men, and the few hundred Knights of St John and about 9000 local men. Against the harsh odds, Malta was successfully defended, and the structures assembled in the 1500’s to defend the island against such an enemy are still intact and observable today.

But the thing that most amazes me is that the Maltese locals have endured all these invasions and occupations and somehow haven’t been completely wiped out somewhere along the long and bloody history of the place. There isn’t that many of them, but they’ve clung on like lichen to a rock.

And interesting enough, Erin is a descendant of these people.

 

 

Malta is small, and I made it my goal to visit every village and town on the island. I didn’t see them all, but I saw most. I saw nice harbours with colourful old fishing boats, rugged coastline stretches, and a lot of churches.  A leftover of the Knights of St John is the rampant Catholicism (98% of pop!), and churches are in abundance. Every small town has at least one big cathedral, and the one in the capital had the most impressive interior I've seen all year.

The island has some of the worlds most ancient buildings, even older than the pyramids (though not much to look at - seems like just a few well organised boulders really.) Its also a summer tourist hotspot for Europeans.

 

Noteworthy food is the great pastizzies, pastries filled with ricotta cheese or peas, and the Maltese sausage, really meaty and salty. Nice and cheap too. (I’ve already ordered a batch of Pastizzies from Erin’s mum for when I get home).

The most enriching experience I had in Malta was renting a room off a guy on the cheap. He gave me a great price of 10 Euro per night, on the condition (which I only learnt when I arrived) that I teach him a bit of English and chat and interact with him and his son so they could learn quicker.  At first I was a bit uneasy – it was a small apartment we were all sharing and there was some rather strange conversation that first night, but it ended up being one of the most invaluable chapters of my year.

Pascal and his son are from Belgium, living and studying English for a year in Malta. They also rented out the room next to mine out, and during my stay I got to befriend a young Italian couple and later a middle aged Algerian couple. We had BBQ’s, chatted over breakfast and dinner, and got to know about each other and our respective countries.

Who wants to stay in a sterile hotel when you can have such diverse roommates as these? It felt like a perfect set up for a sitcom.

 I was especially interested in getting to know the Algerian couple, and the woman in particular spoke English quite well. After about a week living together the conversations started to get interesting. We were past the small talk, and I was ready to have some big discussions with a Muslim woman, someone who I would otherwise never get a chance to talk with.  She told me about growing up in Algeria with the common threat of terrorism, she lost her brother in law to a terrorist attack, and being scared to go to sleep as a little girl for fear the terrorist would burst into her house shouting and shooting in the middle of the night.

On an equally dramatic note we spoke about gender equality, arranged marriage, religion and politics. For a level headed woman who taught computer science at a university level, I was outright shocked at some of the things she had to say.

After I told her that I don’t have much patience for theology, we got talking about talking about evolution.

‘I believe in evolution, but just not of humans,’ she said.

‘So humans aren’t animals?’ I asked, expecting her to concede my point. But instead she said no; humans aren’t animals.

Other fragments of conversation include;

‘There’s something inside a woman which means she’s more attuned to cooking and cleaning than men,’ she said.

‘So you think its nature over nurture for women in the kitchen,’ I said half as a joke, but was surprised when she looked at me earnestly and said ‘Oh, yes.’

She also had some equally outrageous things to say about arranged marriage, pork meat and Christianity. I didn’t even bother to ask her about legalised homosexual marriage.

I liked Fatimah, she was pleasant and witty, but I was shocked at the way she thought. I had always hoped that the educated minds of the world could always find common grounds in something like science and reasoning if we’re going to keep this thing afloat. But here I was, talking to university lecturer of computer science, science is in the title for God’s sake (pun intended), a leading mind in her own respect, and she wasn’t even scientifically literate.

It was kind of depressing.

Nonetheless, it was a great to be able to talk to her about the big bang theory over breakfast - the Devoted and the Infidel. And living with the Belgium’s was equally interesting and rewarding, just a little less provocative.

This bizarre experience made me never want to stay in a hotel again and put the cherry on top of my stay on Malta’s main island.