The Radical Sabbatical: Malta

November 3 through 7, 2022

Malta was an interesting but short visit to a country I knew nothing about (besides my Wikipedia browsing 😉). Because of its prime location in the Mediterranean, it has a unique blend of Italian, Arabic, and British culture (it was under British rule for a long time before it gained its independence in 1974). Its language is Maltese which honestly sounds like someone speaking Arabic with an Italian accent (no offense intended) 😃. The word for "thank you" is even something close to "grazie". The street names all sound Arabic but are written in Maltese, the grocery stores actually stock British candies, and there are dozens of Italian restaurants (we also had a fabulous Indian meal and a wonderful BBQ dinner 😋).

We spent our first 2 days there relaxing and making our way to the capital (Valletta). There is no shortage of boats and yachts and the harbors are quite beautiful. Although the weather looked great to us, there was a storm approaching ☔ so all boat tours were cancelled for the weekend, so my tour options became very limited. I did manage to do 2 tours while Art played in the backgammon tournament (not his best, but he had fun 😏). Malta seems to have more infrastructure than some places in this part of the world so we were able to flush toilet paper down the toilet (yay!) but I still think the water tasted a bit sketchy (even though they said we could drink it 😑). Tourism is a big industry but the logistics seem to be a work-in-progress; the tour bus I was supposed to take was over 20 minutes late and when we mentioned that, we were told with a hand-wave "ah, it's Malta" 😒. My tours covered a fair bit of the history and culture of the island so I learned a thing or two (which I will not bore you with here). I did get the feeling this is a popular destination for Brits and rich people with boats. I also got to see the famous Blue Grotto which was quite gorgeous, and thanks to the storm, had some amazing waves crashing. My photos don't do it justice.

Things I learned in Malta: finding my favorite cereal for breakfast and having cold milk is enough to make my day 👍 (also wanting good OJ is apparently too much to ask); good chocolate makes me happy (and they do actually carry Malteasers in Malta); finding hair gel made me even happier 😅; being able to flush toilet paper down the toilet is something no one should take for granted 😄; finding a post office that sells international post card stamps also makes me happy (I managed to send out 10 cards); local markets are one of my favorite things to explore in a new country (and this one was incredible and huge); I can never bring myself to eat rabbit (even if it's this country's big delicacy); ribs made right are one of my favorite meals; I absolutely love fabulously blue (Mediterranean) water; I love seeing/collecting UNESCO world heritage sites; reading as a hobby needs to be more a part of my leisure time after this trip ends (I've already read 13 books just on this trip); I need to quit Instagram after this trip because tracking my "likes" is making me a bit crazy 😔; I love trying out massages in different countries (and I've learned that an expensive massage can be mediocre); 3 days in a new country isn't quite enough time to explore (especially when weather can be an issue 🌧); and that I miss my kids with a deep heart-ache 💕.

We've learned that many of these islands' peak season ends in October, so we've been pretty lucky to see anything in "shoulder season", but also happy to be past the tourist crowd season. Decent tradeoff, in my opinion. Bonus aside: I got to do a mitzvah quite by accident in Malta. I found a lost credit card on the side of the road and with a bit of Facebook sleuthing (thanks Laurel 😀) I was able to reunite it with its owner in one day!

Although Art and I had some challenges here (related to communication and backgammon), we managed to work through them 💑. Communication is key, isn't it? I'm a bit late on this post, so we're already in Cyprus for the BIG backgammon tournament. I'll leave that for a future post.

Deena and Art