Author: Jacques René Zammit

Categories
Festschrift 2012

antoine cassar – triq il-maqluba

And here’s the quiet, calm enigmatic wordsmith of mosaics and passports. Antoine Cassar was a mysterious conundrum of linguistic curiosity wrapped up in a zen like attitude of constant reflection and awe. I will never forget the first ever contemporaneous blogging event that took place spontaneously at the airport. Xifer, Maqluba and J’accuse kicked off. Ten minutes later J’accuse was up. Fifteen Xifer was ready. Half an hour later Maqluba began his spellcheck. It all happens slowly in the world of il-Maqluba (ex-Qrendi now Luxembourg). But it happens nicely and the description can be bewitching. Here goes. 

Kos, seba’ snin diġà? Jew seba’ snin biss? Inħosshom ħafna u nħosshom ftit. ‘L hawn jew ‘l hemm, nifraħ ħafna lil seħibna Jacques u nneħħilu l-kappell li m’għandix. Is-7 numru sabiħ. Kważi kważi daqs l-iktar numru għal qalbi, it-8. Timbuttah bil-ħlewwa, jitlef il-bilanċ, u jsirlek l-infinit.

 Tant ġrat xorti tul l-aħħar seba’ snin li qed narahom proprju bħala infinità; jew biex inkunu iktar preċiżi, infinità li għaddiet bi żbrixx. Seba’ snin ilu bħal-lum u bħal dal-ħin, hemm ċans kbir li kont ġo kmajra mdawla l-Qrendi, iċċassat lejn l-iskrin ta’ laptop ormaj goff qisu xi ċanguna, nistudja jew nikteb. Tlettax-il sena wara li tvenvina żbuxxlata tax-Xlokk kienet bagħtitni nixxejjer bejn Londra u Madrid, kont inżilt lura l-Blata bl-iskop, imwaħħar iżda mhux wisq, li nitkisser fil-Malti u għal darba nitgħallmu sew. L-ewwel għalliema tiegħi kienet il-kuġina Francesca, li dak iż-żmien kellha tnax-il sena, u llum, oħroġ il-għaġeb, prima ballerina u ballerina mill-iprem, diġà bdiet iddur l-Ewropa, tiżfen fuq ponot subgħajha mill-ġenn ta’ Marsilja u Istanbul għall-wesgħat tat-Toscana. Inħobbok Frans!

 Jekk seba’ snin ilu bħal-lum u bħal dal-ħin ma kontx qed intektek fil-kmajra, wisq probabbli kont fil-kċina npaċpaċ man-nanniet. Kienu huma l-iktar li għallmuni. Kuljum xi storja, kuljum xi tifkira, kuljum xi taqbila, jew anki xi xogħfa mistħoqqa minħabba xi guffaġni minn tiegħi. Illum siefru t-tnejn li huma; in-nannu, li kien jibża’ mill-ajruplani u qatt ma tħajjar jitla’ fuq bastiment lejn l-Awstralja, għall-ewwel darba. Dejjem kien irid jifhem iktar id-dinja, u l-mistoqsijiet tiegħu ta’ ġeografija kienu jkunu bl-ikbar kurżità. Idejh tant kienu kbar li stajt tifrex fuqhom mappamundi sħiħa. Min jaf x’veduta għandu tal-globu issa, minn hemm fuq…

Qed ngħid “hemm fuq”, u qed niftakar f’waħda mill-ħsibijiet li kont ħarbixt f’xi bloggata bikrija ta’ Triq il-Maqluba. Mhux li nemmen fl-infern u fil-ġenna. Jekk hemm infern, x’aktarx ikun is-sentiment ta’ ħtija, ta’ dispjaċir, ta’ żmien moħli f’dawk l-aħħar waqtiet qabel nintfew. U viċiversa, il-ġenna tkun is-sentiment ta’ sodisfazzjon, ta’ ċirku tond, ta’ kuxjenza mhux biss nadifa iżda wkoll hienja. Dakinhar li mort insellem lin-nannu fil-mortwarju, avolja idejh kienu inġazzati, wiċċu kien tbissima minn widna għal widna.

 Wara l-kuġina u n-nanniet, fil-bloggosfera Maltija sibt għalliema oħra. Kont skoprejtha b’ċikka permezz ta’ artiklu fil-Wikipedija Maltija (jekk niftakar sew, id-definizzjoni tal-kelma blogg, diġà bil-g doppja, attribwita lil ċertu Mark Vella ta’ Xifer). U f’daqqa waħda l-mikrokożmu ta’ Malta – in-nomadu ta’ ġo fija kien diġà beda jsus wara l-eremit – infetaħli beraħ. Ftaħt il-blogg tal-Maqluba u dlonk sibt ruħi, għall-ewwel darba fi żmien twil wisq, parti minn komunità Maltija. U tal-Kinnie generation, anki jekk kont ġej minn sfond differenti. Dak iż-żmien kont għadni nteftef fil-mużajki, esperiment li rnexxa u mbagħad b’xorti tajba falla, u kelli daqsxejn ta’ battibekk letterarju ma’ Ereżija tal-Kriżi… u kif tegħlibha. Tiftakarha, Alex? “Ave, Ġakbu Joyce!” Ħeħe. Ma domniex ma sirna ħbieb tal-qalb. Aktar tard tfaċċa l-ħabib tal-qalb l-ieħor, Kevin ta’ Ħġejjeġ. Bis-saħħa tiegħu, u iktar mill-bogħod, bis-saħħa tat-Tgedwid ta’ Immanuel, bdejt insir midħla wkoll tal-letteratura kontemporanja lokali. U tal-ħafna diskorsi alternattivi li kienu jsiru fuq il-politika u s-soċjali, fuq il-kultura u l-lingwa, fuq l-eliti liberali u krepuskolari. U fuq ċerta nostalġija għall-80s, l-iktar it-tieni nofs tad-deċennju, iż-żmien li fih kont niġġerra fit-toroq tal-Qrendi. Mhux kollox kont insejt, minkejja l-aċċent imxajtan li kaxkart minn barra. Fil-bloggosfera kelli mnejn nikkonsla.

 Il-bloggej (jew bloggista? Tiftakru l-Imweġja , l-istudju lingwistiku li konna għamilna fuq il-bloggs jew bloggijiet jew blogog, tant konna daħħalna rasna fil-garigori ta’ sormna?) … Kont qed ngħid, il-bloggej l-iktar dixxiplinat u l-iktar spontanju kien Jacques, jimbotta u jxewwex ta’ kuljum, iżommna fuq saqajna, jiġifieri mwaħħlin bilqiegħda nikklikkjaw u nittajpjaw. U minn Jacques għadni nitgħallem ftit ftit sal-lum, jien u nsegwi mill-bogħod. Ma nistagħġeb xejn bil-fatt li għadu jakkuża. Ad altiora, kif kitibli darba fuq il-blogg tal-Maqluba. Daqs sena oħra, nixtieq inkun hemm biex nimbuttaw it-8 flimkien, ħa nisimgħuh jinstabat bil-ħlewwa mal-art.

U bi tbissima, ghax b’hekk, dawk il-waqtiet tal-ahhar ta’ qabel nintfew ma jaslu qatt.

Categories
Festschrift 2012

maltagirl – diverse ramblings

Welcome to “eine festschrift fur j’accuse”. You’ll be getting a post an hour from now on. We begin with the ladies. And it’s not a causal coincidence that we start with Ms Maltagirl – the lady who can claim to be Malta’s longest running blogger tracing her blog beginnings waaaay back in 2001. J’accuse has fond memories of her interventions in the Blogosfera MMV (as I like to call it). Most of all we appreciated her “Karnival tal-Bloggijiet” complete with prizes and nominations. Especially when we won. Thank you Maltagirl… here goes.

When Jacques invited me to participate in his Festschrift, I was honoured.

Right until I realised that the point of a Festschrift is to honour one person, and the idea of a person inviting others to honour himself seems rather presumptuous.

However, in typical J’Accuse style, he managed to pull off something that, attempted by anyone else, would seem like a self-important stunt. Coming from Jacques, though, it inspires a roll of the eyes, a chuckle, and enough motivation to give up two a few several hours of scarce leisure time in order to write this post.

In its heyday, back in 2005/6, the Maltese Blogosfera featured some very interesting people. It was the first time most of us had ever had the opportunity to say something and have it published, unedited, in a place where anyone could read it, and it was exhilarating to be able to write whatever you wanted.

Some people wrote about their passions, for example the linguist who used multiple languages, including Maltese, in the same poem. Some, like myself, used blogging to tell stories about everyday life, like the time I was at a church dinner and found out I had just eaten nuts I’m allergic to, and shouted a rude word in front of half the congregation. Others, like Jacques, were a little more highbrow and blogged their political opinions and commented on current affairs.

Jacques was an integral part of our little community of Maltese bloggers, and so highly was he esteemed that in the 2nd Annual Maltese Blog Awards in 2006, he was nominated in the “Pundit” catagory, and indeed won it.

One of best the memories that I have about Jacques and his early blogging career was the discussion that raged up and down the Maltese blogosphere after he coined the term “wankellectual“, and I have to say that I loved this new word because it is a remarkably succinct and satisfying way of describing… that sort of a person.

Jacques’ opinions, yes, were always strong. He was never wishy-washy about issues.

His saving grace was that, even while being offensive, and expressing the above-mentioned strong opinions that you did not necessarily agree with, he was never condescending and was not shy of poking fun at himself.

The fact that he did not hesitate to apply the term “wankellectual” to himself meant that even his detractors would at least listen to what he had to say.

As a female engineering student, and later engineer, I was mostly interested in musical theatre lessons, going out with my boyfriend (who I then married), enjoying books, films and plays, and blogging the mishaps that seemed to befall me with regularity.

Thanks to Jacques, though, and other Maltese bloggers such as Fausto Majistral, for the first time in my life I was reading insightful pieces about politics. For the first time, politics was more than obnoxious people shouting loudly at each other on television or pontificating in the press.

Politics started to be *interesting*.

So I definitely owe that to Jacques, and his engaging style kept me reading long after I would have otherwise lost interest in the topic.

To conclude, I would like to share with you some classic Jacques from way back when.

The best way to do this would be to point you to one of the Karnival tal-Bloggijiet posts that I initiated back in June of 2005, and which ran for thirteen editions before dying a natural death a year later.

The premise behind the Karnival is that any and all Maltese bloggers (a loose phrase that includes all bloggers connected to Malta in any way) were invited to submit links to their own blogs in order to showcase their writing. This was a great way for us to discover blogs that we may not have previously known about, and read interesting posts that we might have otherwise missed.

The Karnival was quite successful while it lasted, and I personally enjoyed it enormously because we invariably wound up with an incredibly eclectic mix of topics. Mundane, sublime, insightful, offensive, the Maltese bloggers blogged it all.

At first I thought to submit the 4th edition of the Karnival for Jacques’ Festschrift, because it featured him twice, in English and Maltese, plus a bonus submission by Gakbu Sfigho, one of my favourite bloggers.

However I then realised that the 9th edition features Jacques no less than seven, count them, seven times, plus there’s still one from Gakbu, AND one of Jacques’ posts in this Karnival even references the origins of that fateful term, “wankellectual“.

Sadly, many of the blogs that were featured in the Karnival have since been deleted or closed, but some of the links still work.

So here you go, a slice of Maltese blogging history, first served up for you in March 2006, just before J’Accuse turned one year old.

Id-Disa’ Karnival tal-Bloggijiet

Congratulations Jacques, on seven years of blogging – may there be many more.

Best regards,
Maltagirl.

Categories
Local Councils Politics

The Ugly Dress Rehearsal

They’re electing representatives of the people in a number of councils tomorrow. From Zebbug (Gozo) to Sliema (Malta) the voters who will bother to take a stroll to the polling booth will be electing a group of people who are supposedly best placed to manage the needs of their locality. That is the principle behind the process of administrative devolution that began in 1993 with the setting up of the local council system.  It’s almost twenty years now and the Kunsilli are ingrained in our political system of representation – for good or for bad – and ever since Labour’s rethink about participation in local politics they have also been a microcosm of our wider political field.

Ever since the times of Cicero, electoral campaigns for the municipium  were a hotly contested affair. As the wikipedia article will tell you the ultimate right for a citizen is the right to vote (civitas optimo iure) – something to be treasured above all. Ugly electoral campaigns are also not something new and notions of slander, corruption and dirty politics on the eve of elections were not exactly invented by the PLPN crowd. Nothing new under the sun there. So what to expect from tomorrow’s vote?

Well, the result per se, should technically not have a meaning beyond enabling us to understand whether our cives have become more intelligent with the use of their ultimate power. At the end of the day the municipal council that is elected in each locality will have an effect on the lives of its citizens via the decisions it takes. It should be obvious to anyone who stops to think for a moment that the ultimate consideration therefore when casting one’s vote is the competence and potential of the candidate. To summarise it more succinctly: It is not WHO is behind the candidate but rather WHO HE IS and WHAT HE STANDS FOR. 

And that is where we start to get complicated. Down on the ground, where it counts, I have no reason to suspect that every candidate contesting the elections and committing his or her time for a few years of civic duty has plans and ideas for the running of his locality. Even better I am sure that in the absolute majority of cases the interest is borne by a love of the locality and a desire to improve it or bring out the best in it. That is after all what the council election is about. All this happens behind the elaborate facade that is the involvement of the major political parties and it is not helped by the fact that this set of elections is the last official public scrutiny before the next general elections.

So we get the ugly dress rehearsal. Once again signs will be read where there are none. For the umpteenth time Labour will make a song and dance about winning local elections when in opposition. It’s not like we have not already been there. It is an exercise in collective dis-education.  Why? Because your criteria when voting for local representatives should be the competence of the candidates and not whether you are exercising your vote to send a message to the Prime Minister. If you are stupid enough to waste the great prerogative that you have to choose the best local representatives because you’d rather be sending some message to the PN government then your idea of how democracy works is seriously flawed.

Labour could not help itself though. Thanks to Franco Debono’s antics it was duped into campaign mode at what turns out to be a very early stage and is now desperately trying to keep the election mode going as much as possible. That is why although we are speaking about local councils and performance the national media is full of arrows and stabs aimed at the heart of “GonziPN”. And then there was the whole RecordingsGate. First Joanna Gonzi then Julian Galea then Gonzi again were caught on tape – unsurprisingly all the candidates were from Cyrus Engerer’s Sliema council. The public heard PN candidates utter the obvious – our inbred tribal hatred was suddenly there for all to see. The PN countered with a few clips of its own – giving the usual suspects pride of place in its counter-information exercise.

The relevance this had for Local Council politics was that it reinforced the idea that PLPN still do not bother to screen candidates to check their suitability for public office. Did we need the recordings to find that out? There is a paucity of political potential already as it is and the recordings only threw the truth into everybody’s face. From Mosta to Sliema the signs of an illness in our system were already evident. As for dress rehearsals for an election we saw the two behemoths unashamedly re-engage in slander and mud-slinging politics where content is relegated to the footnotes of a manifesto. There it was – a race to uncover the sleaziest candidate, long-forgotten criminal records unveiled and more. What should have been a legitimate exercise of democratic checks-and-balances became a witch-hunt.

Then came Muscat’s Iron Lady performance. As others have pointed out it was obvious were Muscat got his Assisian inspiration from. The Labour leader would have fared much better had he memorised another great line from the movie: It used to be about trying to do something, now it’s all about trying to be someone. And that really hits the nail on the head. With the politics of taste that were inaugurated early this century substance makes way for charades, for strutting and for many words that cannot be backed by thoughts and ideas. Values have been thrown out of the window and marketing and imagery is all the vogue.

With our politicians busy playing along the weary scripts and jumping from one pleasant bandwagon to the next in the hope of boosting their already bloated caricatures on this stage we have only a huge dramatic performance to look forward to come next national elections. For now we have been regaled with some very ugly scenes that made for a horrible dress rehearsal. 

But let us not forget that there cannot be a play or a charade without an audience. It brings me back to the intelligent use of the vote. It’s not, as many may think, simply an appeal to vote for alternattiva demokratika. It’s a much wider appeal for the citizen to finally live up to this immense responsibility and make the right choices. Look through the candidates. Look at them beyond the colours they represent and seriously ask yourself what you can see them doing six months down the line that can improve the state of your community. Accept any other criterion beyond that and you are making a fool of yourself. 

And as a fool, you might as well join the other pagliacci on stage….

Vesti la giubba,
e la faccia infarina.
La gente paga, e rider vuole qua.
E se Arlecchin t’invola Colombina,
ridi, Pagliaccio, e ognun applaudirà!
Tramuta in lazzi lo spasmo ed il pianto
in una smorfia il singhiozzo e ‘l dolor, Ah!

Ridi, Pagliaccio,
sul tuo amore infranto!
Ridi del duol, che t’avvelena il cor!

 

Categories
Politics

The Frontier Psychiatrist

Given that it is hard to keep up with the emptiness that is offered from our political milieu two days before a set of local council elections campaign, given also that I do not have the time required to set up a proper SHTF satirical video in Blobb style, given that there are two days till the jamboree of posts celebrating the  sevenversary of this blog and finally given that I have a post in draft that has been waiting to come out;

Given all that and more I though of just posting this video as a prequel to the actual post that is a summary of what we have seen in this campaign for the local councils (the actual post will be called “The Ugly Dress Rehearsal”. Don’t ask why I chose this particular one. Or at least don’t ask me. Do your research.

 

Categories
Retro J'accuse

Immigrants & Refugees (Utopia)

Anniversaries are also a time to look back at what we have done. I’ve decided to pull a series of posts from J’accuse’s past into a new rubrique called “Retro J’accuse”. This first one remains a topical issue. It deals with the way we treat immigrants in our country and was prompted by a Sunday Times of Malta editorial that, how can I put it, was not exactly brilliant. From March 27 2006 – here’s Immigrants & Refugees:

Imagine a day not very far from this one. Imagine that you have packed your suitcase with the absolutely necessary and that you are in line to get onto a plane out of the country. The country that is now called Ave Melita (yes they would probably name it something that stupid) is no longer your home. The government’s latest policy is called “Min ma joghgbux jitlaq” and you have taken one of the last places available in this scheme and you are heading to a new life into another country that you will have to call home – away from the sun, sea and Xarabank that you loved so much.

You could not stay. Your conscience did not allow you to stay silent infront of measures like “Malta tal-Maltin (suwed barra)” and the latest one called “Dissoluzzjoni tal-Ordni tal-Gizwiti”. You collected your papers from the Centru Nazzjonali tal-Purifikazzjoni, the former Jesuit College in Birkirkara, and sped with haste to the airport with tears in your eyes. Your stomach still has to be emptied on a regular basis as you adjust to the new reality and you see the same empty, desperate look in the fellow passengers of this forced abortion of nationals. You still cannot bring yourself to explain what has happened in your country and why you have to leave it so fast. But you have no time to do so. You have to begin to adjust to the new country.

The new country is not like those Mediterranean pits that were reserved for the boat people. Like them, it knew you were coming. Unlike them it did not reserve a hastily built slum for you to call as home. You live in a former army barrack but your tiny room has running water, electricity and there is even a communications and technology room for all immigrants to keep contact with the world. Morale is low – no one wanted to be here. The authorities try to be accomodating and to relieve the greatest troubles. They create a scheme for economic support. Different jobs in the local market are made available. Unlike the Mediterranean nightmares that you used to read about you are to be allowed to scrape away a little earning in order to be self-sufficient and be able to hope for brighter days.

When you venture out into the street , the locals are understanding. Although your complexion is very much like those of the terrorists who bombed and targeted their nation with violent attacks at train stations and on buses, very few make the quick and illogical assumption that you could be of the same ilk. You are offered lifts to work. You join the local carpool and although you are not working as the University Professor that you were in Malta, your life as a shoe salesman in this little town allows you to live with dignity even though your career and dreams have been put on hold.

Then one day a local radical paper falls into your hands. Your eyes cannot believe what they see. They seem to have caught up with you. Those bungling buffoons who were in power in Malta seem to have found a foothold even in this welcoming state, here is what they say:

“Surely, there are ways of keeping them busy and alleviating their boredom. For example, they should help, in their own interest, to keep toilets clean. Also, could not some scheme of putting them to work on public cleaning projects, under strict supervision, and for a small allowance, improve things? There are many jobs they could be given – God knows the island needs a massive sprucing up! The scheme could start with a few small groups, and eventually expanded. Naturally it must be ensured that at the end of their day’s work, they return to “base”.” source

 

In this new country you had been allowed to find a job through an Immigrant Job Assistance scheme. In Malta they wanted to turn immigrants into Chain Gangs. Desperate beings who had reached the lowest of the turningpoints in their life, who had abandoned their family and the little social sustenance they had in the hope of a new life would be used to spruce up the island under strict supervision.

You discard the paper and turn on the TV in your room – the one you just bought with the money put aside from your first two months’ salary.

They will be everywhere. The intolerant, the coocooned as well as the well-meaning bumblers. You remember that massacres in India and Africa under the colonial regime were prompted by well-meaning actions of the Evangelical communities who intended to civilise the misbelieving miscreants. And you begin to notice how some things never change. How difficult it is to achieve genuine tolerance based on brotherly love and not the tolerance that relies on looking down a snobbish nose into the eyes of the tolerated, and humiliated human being?

This just cannot be real.


****

Note: The extract in quotes is taken from the editorial of the Sunday Times of Malta – 26th March 2006. It refers to the illegal immigrants and refugees who were bundled into housing under atrocious conditions and is a partial reaction to the new uproar created by a visit of European Parliament inspectors who were among the first outsiders to be allowed by the democratic Republic of Malta to inspect the conditions. The visit had prompted escapes from detention by immigrants eager to show their plight to the visiting MEPS (and who cares how they got to know about the visit? Why should they not know about it?). Following the escapes, police in Floriana were seen stopping anyone who is black while passers by called for a all immigrants to be rounded up and burnt in a square.

It is possible that the above summary is as biased as it could get. But even the possibility that it is one tenth of the truth makes me feel ashamed that I am Maltese.

Categories
Mediawatch

Have I Got News for You

I have recently been getting a creeping feeling that I am the only person in the world that listens to certain Maltese radio stations. It’s not just that, because I also think that they only operate when I tune in and stop speaking/playing music the moment I switch station. How do I know it? Easy. Because the DJ speaks to ME. Just me. It’s either that or his or her grammar is limited to the second person singular.

How else to explain phrases like “Se indoqqlok id-diska l-ġdida ta’ Beyonce”? or “Għandna premju għalik li qed tisma bħalissa”? It’s irritating. I know, given the benefit of internet streaming radios why the hell am I torturing myself with Bay Radio’s Breakfast with Drew when I could be listening to RTL, RTBF Classic 21, or London’s Heart or even Waikiki Radio? It’s just that every now and then I do feel like listening to a morning drive show from home and possibly catch up with the news on the hour. So I have to submit to being spoken to directly by a DJ and I begin to worry whether he can see me getting dressed in my bedroom. Rather invasive isn’t it this language business?

And that’s not all. I have an aversion to the conversion of the pronunciation of placenames to English. How does Birkirkara get to be pronounced Bear-Kuhr-Kah-Rah? And Imrieħel suddenly becomes Emm-ray-hell. Is it cool? Does it make the place sound more cosmopolitan? What’s the deal? Why?

So please Mr DJ. I don’t know you. I am not on first name terms with you and do return to using the plural. If not for the sake of imagining an audience that numbers more than one then just think of me as the King – the one who deserves a royal plural. Whatever you do, the English “accent” (especially some conjured up cross-mix of brummie/eastender) was never, ever intended to be applied to the sweet arabic sounds of Maltese.

(This post is being republished to test WordPress to Facebook handling of comments.)