Appearance:
Scruffy looking with long hair and a fuzzy beard.

Where did you see him last?
He was sailing off Selmun drinking a cup of tea when all of sudden a storm engulfed his galleon. Unfortunately for him the Roman Maritime Authority forgot to set up a buoy in the bay's opening.

What happened next?
Paul took control of the ship and steered it … into the rocks and…

Then?
Paul exclaimed "Haqq ****" and started packing his bags.

Who greeted him?
The governor by the name of Publius, the Roman Maritime Authority and a journalist from the ‘Mare Nostrum’ daily.

Anyone else?
A group of locals who called themselves ‘Maltin’, who asked him if he wanted to rent a Roman villa at Rabat for three gold coins and a chicken.

What did Paul say?
Paul said he was very hungry and would prefer to recite a story in return for a barbecued leg of a lamb.

Please continue:
The ‘Maltin’ got some firewood and placed the leg of lamb over the fire. In the meantime Paul took out a plastic snake and as he approached the fire he pretended that he had been bitten by the snake. He calmly grabbed the plastic snake and threw it into the fire.

Then what?
The plastic started to burn and the leg of lamb ended up tasting really bad.

And what is the moral of this legend?
Never trust a hungry man carrying illegally-imported plastic reptiles.

Stop the bouncing around

From Niam Bezzina, Chairperson Alternattiva Demokratika Studenti

Unfortunately, the number of cases where bouncers in local bars and clubs seem to take advantage of their position with excessive behaviour, including violence, is increasing.
It is only recently that two foreign youngsters reported such a situation, stating they had been brutally kicked out of one of Paceville's nightclubs just because the place was about to close. The Swedes, apart from showing their disgust at such behaviour, commented that they'll bear their experience in mind if they ever have to consider coming on holiday to Malta again. And then it happened just a few days ago, this time right in front of my eyes. In another club a bouncer just started slapping a teenager violently simply because he was looking at him. Apparently the bouncer was also slightly drunk which certainly didn't help matters as he repeatedly hit the guy.
I can assure you that I do not want to generalise about the behaviour of bouncers. We do have the kind who do their job in a very professional way, especially when it comes to avoiding trouble or violence in our local clubs. However, in some cases it seems bouncers are hired mainly because of their physical build, rather than for their experience and qualifications, as is in fact done abroad. I can't stress enough the importance of stopping bouncers from bullying people. Their job might involve preventing trouble, but sometimes they are the ones blowing the situation out of proportion, thereby abusing their position.

A candle in the wind

From John Buttigieg

To mark the death of Doreen Micallef, a poet and friend, ‘Poezijaplus’ organised a meeting to honour her memory at the Manoel Theatre's Courtyard on 28 January.
It is a known fact that most things on this tiny island of ours do not always evolve as one desires them to do. However not everything is that dark and frustrating and underneath the thick layer of negativism there are instants when you feel proud to be a member of this community. One such example is the meeting, which ‘Poezijaplus’ organised at the Manoel Theatre's courtyard to pay tribute to Doreen Micallef, a poet and friend who departed this life at the end of November last year. Her loss, after a brief but intense illness shocked us all. Many artists and literary critics consider Doreen the best female poet of contemporary local literature. Her talent to speak through verse was impressive, she had a subtle way of managing her life, which, indeed, she lived in complete misery. If it were not for her poetry, she would have been left alone, even on her deathbed. The evening dedicated to her memory, was in a way a manifestation of gratitude, the impressive number of female writers that attended and read their poetry was in itself a show of force that in Malta not all is black or white.
Charles Briffa, the President of the ‘Akkademja tal-Malti’, took the floor to share his experience of Doreen. Before he started his brief contribution, Charles asked those present to allow him to light a small candle given to him by Doreen herself. It was a moment of great pathos.
Everything was done with dignity. Matilde Balzan recited several works of the late poet, which until then had never been read or published. Vince Fabri and Rita Pace sang songs from their repertoire, whereas the simple unfolding of the meeting met exactly with what Doreen might have liked if she were still here. A lady who was easily touched by a scene of stray cats in the narrow streets of Valletta where she lived until she died. Her manner of making herself visible and invisible at the same time, Doreen was without the slightest of doubt a true artist who lived her life on the edge wrapped around her existential christocentric dimension that was never absent in her life. In fact her publications speak of three different stages in this journey towards Christ: The way of the Empire, De Prufundis and Kryie are but sparks of an intense life divided on three levels of spiritual experience. The contribution by Mario Azzopardi was exactly this, a brief retrospection on what he knew of Doreen, and what was the physical result of a life ended in haste. Mario, who with Francis Galea joined to collect Doreen's personal belongings from her house, described what he saw as decrepit and undoubtedly not human. He could see that she was already ill by June from the medical certificates he found scattered in the house with a bold ‘Urgent’ printed on several of them.
Doreen Micallef was a woman who suffered through her sensitive genetic features, she was not always understood and at times even isolated because her worries were not considered important or useful. She persisted in this life as much as she detached herself from living up to its challenges. Her worth is not to be judged from what she did to enhance her career, but in what she did not do. She remained elevated in her spiritual dimension to bear witness that life is elsewhere and that to understand the mystery of living is to share from its most basic deposit of pain.

In my long life I have heard politicians utter many lies.
One often used when they are faced with a problem is to say, "Wait until we are members of the European Union and they will give us money to solve our problems".
But there is never a free lunch. The EU takes a fixed agreed portion of a member country’s taxation (subject to certain exceptions).
It seldom pays outright grants to member countries - those days are over. All monies are paid with a degree of ‘additionality’, which means that when a member country makes an application for EU funds, only a varying proportion is paid by the EU, 5%, l0%, 20% - rarely more.
The applicant country has to raise the balance as a condition before the proportion from the EU is paid.
So the political decision to pay out the money for the national purpose is not made by our elected representatives in our country, but by the EU.
The money paid by the EU comes from the contribution made by the member country to the EU.
This is often more expensive and certainly takes longer than it would if the member country had raised the money from taxation and paid the full amount themselves.
What will happen after the next round of accessions to the EU is likely to be the same as what we witnessed when West Germany merged with East Germany; taxes shot up, there was a huge rise in unemployment in the west, and now a full recession. I see that very little monies will be available as outright grants, I see no evidence of political will among the present EU members to increase their own contributions to give money to the joining nations.
The new members have been given such high expectations by their politicians as they sell membership of the EU that when the reality of membership takes place, the electorate will feel badly let down by those they elected to look after them.