Malta should get into the habit of thinking about itself as part of a global village more often

What are we skinning? ? It’s a celebratory one! We’re waving goodbye to a deadly global pandemic and officially welcoming a new reigning monarch for our former colonisers, after Charles III was finally crowned yesterday.

Why are we skinning it? Largely because both of these things are global events that still impact Malta and the Maltese to some degree, and it’s refreshing (and even, perhaps, necessary) to be reminded that our little island still forms part of a large and interconnected world.

But Malta was always part of the world. Yet we don’t seem to behave like it most of the time, do we?

How do you mean? From our sense of exceptionalism when it comes to a la carte requests from the European Union (on hunting, and other matters) to our historic sense of Catholic superiority and specialness, down to our ‘have our cake and eat it too’ attitude to being a tax haven while also wanting to be respected as a bona fide European country...

Maybe we’ve bought into the idea that we’re the same fairy tale destination advertised in our tourist materials, except all year round. And completely disconnected to the devastating machinery that makes such a mechanism run in the first place, yes.

Speaking of fairy tales though, that Coronation certainly showed that the apple doesn’t fall far from the delusion tree, even far yonder in the land of our former colonisers. Many will disagree with you there -- and perhaps a degree of fantasy is necessary to brighten up our otherwise mundane and sometimes turgid existence -- but it is true that accusations of archaism have become all the more rife now that the fixture that was Queen Elizabeth II has passed away, and the torch was merely handed to her successor.

So it’s less of COVID-induced ‘new normal’ and more of an ‘old normal’ with a freshly polished crown up top. Yes, which is deflating in and of itself. Never mind that the monarch in question is already past 70.

He has his fans in Malta though. As a former colony that is currently run by a member of a slightly less glitzy dynasty and business interests that traffic in nothing more glamorous than endless concrete blocks, it’s hardly surprising that we’d want to grasp at some of that leftover royal pageantry.

Shame that the Brits doubled down on their own insularity after Brexit. Maybe we’re not so alone in all of this after all, though we have chosen to stick to the EU.

Then COVID showed up to reveal how our insularities are all a delusion. Right? That MAY have been a silver-lining to a mass-murdering pandemic.

But? But alas, it wasn’t so. The idea of a united front was quickly revealed to be another delusion, with each country scrambling to tweak the rules and restrictions to fit both the exigencies of its respective nations, as well as their economic make-up.

It seems like we will always be alone. At least we’re temporarily pandemic-free, while a new king reigns up top.

What a time to be alive. Getting through the pandemic was totally worth it, right?

Do say: “Malta should get into the habit of thinking about itself as part of a global village more often.”

Don’t say: “To be honest, ‘devastating global phenomenon the likes of which we haven’t seen in nearly a century’ could apply to both COVID and a new English monarch.”