Author: Jacques René Zammit

This article and accompanying Bertoon appear in today’s edition of The Malta Independent on Sunday.

One of the top selling books in Italian bookshops this August is called “Scusami ma ti voglio sposare” (I’m sorry but I wish to marry you). An apology before a request to marry would seem unusual unless one is of the idea that marriage as an institution is more of a punishment than an ideal situation. Again, the question of “marriage” is dealt with from the point of view of current Italian legislation on the matter and not in abstract.

The title is funny in itself and of itself – even if one fails to agree or disagree with the basic import of its statement. It’s a bit like saying, “I’m sorry we’re going to have to fly abroad” – a weird statement until one learns that flying abroad involves low-cost carriers that force you into an immediate heightened sense of consciousness as to each and every gram contributed to your inflight baggage (hand or checked-in). You see, normally you would not be sorry to have to fly or go abroad, but flying with low-cost carriers can have the abnormal effect of removing part of the fun of travel.

All this gripe because as I type during my last few minutes in the rented villa on the outskirts of Mazara del Vallo I still have on my mind a bottle of cinnamon grappa that is surplus to the overall weight limit of the group of six who will be boarding the plane from Trapani to Malta in a few hours. It kills me to have to leave it behind and I can only thank god that the ridiculous suggestion of charging passengers according to their weight has not already been taken up for I fear that the copious amounts of delicious food consumed here would have had an adverse effect on the excess bill charged by the unobliging ground staff employed at arms length by the kings of consumer dissatisfaction.

Mazara
Mr Manzo, the architect whose family own the magnificent rented villa (and who suspects that the Knights of Malta had something to do with the management thereof at some point) had suggested a quaint shop in town to buy home made artisan ceramics to take to Malta as a souvenir. When we did find the shop in Via Itria in Mazara it was immediately clear that the architect’s suggestion was not a frivolous one. The couple who ran the shop and who hand-made all the goods had an impressive range of products on display. Even the least interested of ceramic non-enthusiasts could get lost in a whole new world of designs and historic patterns brought back to life by this artisan couple.

Punters interested in the ceramics could even avoid being ridiculously overcharged for extra in-flight weight by shipping packages from the Mazara post office straight to their doorstep. Anyways, I mentioned Mr Manzo with the owners and they confirmed that he was one of their prime patrons who never missed an opportunity to buy his wedding gifts from their establishment. There we go again. Weddings and wedding gifts. I couldn’t help but wonder about the recurring theme -from the bookshops in the various towns, to the wedding gifts in shops to the weddings being celebrated in the boiling heat in churches – marriages seemed to be an underlying theme on the holiday.

“As a movement, the Church enters into this political sphere by offering its vision to society. This is true of the Church as an institution, but it also true for each and every believer that adheres to it: that what he believes in motivates the way that he forms part of society and his contribution to society, otherwise he would be living in contradiction. These beliefs include not only the supernatural, but also the deeply-held convictions of what is good to society in terms of environmental protection, social justice, political ethics and all other social ideals. When the Church and its members enter this kind of dialogue with society, they are motivated by their beliefs. But when communicating their ideas, they do so in a ‘secular way’, comprehensible to all.”
-Archbishop Paul Cremona, Times of Malta (23.08.09)

Esteemed readers, ladies, gentlemen and wankellectuals, this blog is now declared reanimated and alive after a deserved, unnanounced pause. We return from the salutary lands and waters of the neighbouring trinacria replenished and recharged. Fear not – the emporium of non-conformist notes and home of the dabblers of insane theories hath not abandoned you. We are now in Malta for a stop before the resumption of the working season. Look out for an announcement of a possible rendez-vous for avid J’accuse readers. A wankellectual têtes-aux-têtes over tea at a preordained teetotaller spot is (probably) what is in the pipeline.

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This article and accompanying Bertoon appeared in today’s edition of The Malta Independent on Sunday.

Yoshida Kogyo Kabushikikaisha

Now that’s quite a mouthful of a name and I doubt many readers would be familiar with it. If I were to limit my tease to the initials YKK I am quite sure that faint flares of recognition will be sparking somewhere in your brain cells allocated to memory and familiarity. You’ve seen it before, time and time again, so it must be something you see or do regularly. Now where could you have heard of this “YKK” before?

It’s Ferragosto (for any queries on that moniker see last year’s article) so I’ll spare you any further intra-cranial efforts that might waste the valuable energy necessary to lift you off the deckchair and walk those five odd steps to the sea. YKK or (Yoshida Kogyo Kabushikikaisha) is by far the world’s largest producers of that ubiquitous item present on clothing apparel and carrier bags known to most of the world as the zip or zipper.

The company philosophy at YKK is “The Cycle of Goodness” which means that one prospers when one renders benefit to others. Which is quite an apt philosophy for this article which was never intended to be an essay on zips but rather one on our fixation with prices and costs – particularly in this the period of travel. I only got to YKK while researching online tips on travelling and examining the pros and cons of different styles of suitcase (including considerations on whether the zipper on aforementioned suitcase is “chain” or “lock”). In order not to have wasted too much of the research time let me give you this tip: if a suitcase manufacturer opts for an anonymous brand of zips rather than world famous names (read YKK) then you may be sure (almost) that it is a cost cutting exercise and not an effort to improve quality. Caveat emptor.

While the Government of Malta struggles to reassure it’s citizens that it will do everything in its power to ensure that Valletta retains its World Heritage Status (funny, for a moment one got the feeling that the Government was the threat in the first place) art around the world has been having a rough time.

Two unrelated stories of persons venting their anger on art pieces have once again shown that people believe that they could use our common heritage as ransom for whatever personal troubles need attention. A russian woman threw a ceramic cup at bullet-proofed Mona Lisa in the Louvre out of frustration for not having obtained French nationality. The wry smile of Da Vinci’s painting must have been the straw that broke the camel’s back and the lady decided to vent her anger at the French administrative system by attempting to destroy one of the iconic images in the Louvre.

Art as a medium to channel our anger? Makes you wonder if this trend will catch on.

Brazilian infomercial urging people to pee in the shower and waste less water. Every time you flush you use about 12 litres of water – around 4,000 litres a year. The solution? Pee in the shower.