No Milk Today

If you're looking for this week's Mużika Mod Ieħor podcast, please note that the series is on a one week break as I take some time off to rest over the Easter period. The next Mużika Mod Ieħor podcast comes to you next weekend. Meanwhile, you can enjoy the most recent offering or one of the other 100+ podcasts in the series.

This is my first weekend back home in Scarborough after a brief visit to Malta. I've blogged some of my thoughts about the visit over the last few blog entires, but I haven't really dedicated a whole post to the visit. There was a time when I would feel that such a piece of writing was an essential part of what this blog was all about. Micro-blogging on sites like Facebook has put an end to that. In the best of worlds, times change and we change with them.

This most recent visit is most memorable for me not because of the general elections which returned Prime Minister Gonzi to the Castille Auberge for another 5 years. *rant alert* My hope there is that he will push for the true political minorities in Malta to have their voices heard in parliament by making sure that seats in the house are truly representative of the number of votes a party gets, rather than some twisted constitutional arrangement that gives a party 4 extra seats in the house for less than 2000 extra votes while a party that gets 3000+ votes is left out of parliament. *end of rant*

During my most recent visit I found myself strangely feeling like I could live in Malta again. This feeling became quite strong during two or three moments during the visit; mostly in relation to friendships and art. I never thought I'd feel this way about Malta again. When I left the country all those years ago I thought that I had left it for good. This is still the case, but surprisingly I no longer feel that I couldn't return if I really had too.

There's no nostalgia involved in this feeling. Anyone who knows me well knows that I'm immune to that nasty malady.

Cartoonist Maurice Tanti Burlo once told me that while I may find that living abroad is a most enriching experience it is only in Malta that I can find the best quality of life. For years I politely discounted this as an opinion of someone who had a different point of view from mine in terms of what living abroad is all about. I am now slowly but surely beginning to see what he was on about. Does this mean I've finally become a grown-up? Good grief!

I seriously doubt I'll ever make Malta my home base again. I've spent far too many years abroad to abandon one lifestyle for another completely.. However, as I've learned from my organic garden, roots aren't easy to destroy completely and the most surprising things can stem from them in appropriate conditions.

Anyway, a very Happy Easter to all readers of this blog. All should be back to "normal" by next weekend.

First Cut is the Deepest

Earlier today I received an email from my father informing me that my dear old friend Roland Friggieri passed away last night after battling a long illness. Roland was a childhood hero for me; you could even say he was a role model of sorts. He was a cool cat before it was hip to be a cool cat in Malta.

I last saw him on Tower Road in Sliema in the summer of 2006. He was just about to retire from work and looked very content. The world was his oyster. Little did I know that he would soon be living the rest of his life of a cancer patient. Knowing him, I'm sure he had no regrets...not even for the perpetual nicotine stains on his fingers.

Of all the people I've met in my life, Roland was undoubtedly the most happy go lucky. Yet, he lived a beautifully paradoxical life, full of grace and a sensibility for some of the finer things this world has to offer. It is quite hard for me to picture him dead.

He was very much like an older brother to me, even though he was actually old enough to be my father. He was a regular patron at my parents' bar on Depiro Street in Sliema. He lived just a few doors up the road anyway, so it was more of a place to hang out than a watering hole for him. Throughout most of the 1970s he would help me out with my homework. His casual coaching had a huge influence on my handwriting and I'll also think of him whenever I do long division without an electronic calculator. My reward for doing all my homework was a regular game of darts or pool in the bar. Needless to say, he taught me how to play both games too.

The complexity of my childhood friendship with Roland came from the fact that while he was a regular fixture in my day-to-day life, providing me with gentle coaching session on my latest school chore, he also provided me with my first on-ramp into the world that his friend J.J. Tellus called "show business". That was a very fascinating world to me as a child. Seeing Roland play a part in the first local production of Jesus Christ Superstar or collaborating with J.J. on his Charlie Chaplin routine remain the earliest staged performance memories from my childhood.

We never really kept in touch when I grew older. Without the bar as a common ground we had no real reason to meet. I'd bump into him here and there from time to time, of course, and he was always incredibly warm towards me. I always felt that Roland's secret was to be satisfied with what he had and never want more than whatever was available.

Rest in peace old friend.

See Saw

2007 is history. If you've followed this blog for more than a year you probably already know that I at the end of every eyar I take stock of the previous 12 months. This all started in 2004 and went on with slight variations the following year and last year. I've come to see it as a way to have a quck look at all (or most of) my blog entries in one go.

So now, for the fourt consecutive year here's a partial, most subjective, list of blog entries from the year gone by, in random order. This list is only meant to mark the highs and lows in my year, as chronicled on my blog throughout 2007:

UPPERS

Interview on BBC Radio York

World's first enhanced Maltese podcasts

Results of the 1st annual MMI Listeners' Picks + MMI podcast: 50th & 75th

Oliva Lewis wins the 2007 Malta Song for Europe

Easter in Malta

Visiting the National Media Museum with my students.

Lunar Eclipse + Eklissi Perpetwi

Pierre J. Mejlak's Riħ Isfel

Second Life - YouTube - Twitter - Facebook

Visiting Helsinki and the 2007 Eurovision Song Contest debacle

Post-Eurovision comments for Malta Today

The Simpsons Movie

Conferences: SL in London + SL-related in Salford

Discovering Drive + Dean Saviour

Patti Smith, Radiohead's In Rainbows + Danjeli's Kakofonija on my iPod

Taking the 2nd annual MMI Listeners' Picks poll to Facebook


DOWNERS

Morrissey is not the UK Eurovision entry

RIP: Apakuki Coka - Jean Baudrillard - David Hatch - Bergman+Antonioni - Tony Wilson - Marcel Marceau - Karlheinz Stockhousen

My friend Ġorġ Mifsud-Chircop is dead

Olivia Lewis' drean turns into a nightmare

Big Brother (not the celebrity version)

10th anniversary from Diana's death

Summer bummer

Radio Malta sinks to further low

Xtruppaw return on the scene with a football anthem

In putting these two lists together I realized that there were a number of things in 2007 I'd have liked to blog about properly but didn't find the time or the muse to do so. At least most of them get a mention here and there, in unrelated posts. Here are the main ones (in random order): Frank Camilleri and Mario Frendo visit Scarborough, Pan's Labyrinth, Amy Winehouse, moving house, transliteracy, 40th anniversary of Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, Steve Dixon's Digital Performance book, support for the Burmese monks, attending academic conferences in Birmingham + Leeds, the joys of organic gardening, Yoko Ono's Yes I'm a Witch, and Joni Mitchell's Shine.

One thing I (very oddly!) didn't blog about was my interview with Clare Agius for her Mhux għall-Kulħadd on TV series. It's available on YouTube, of course. Perhaps that's why I forgot to blog about it.

Anyway, many thanks for reading my blog and listening to my podcasts in 2007 and a special thanks if you contributed to all that in any way...I wish you a very happy new year!

Pastime Paradise

I've just heard some sad news on the radio. David Hatch has died at the age of 68. There are some remarkable people who never really become household names even though they help many become household names during their career. I think it's fair to say that David was one such person. This is to say nothing of his relatively recent knighthood.

It was a thrill to meet him in 1988 when I was a trainee at the BBC. You can see me here in a photo taken in his Broadcasting House office as he presented me with my certificate at the end of my training course. He was Managing Director of BBC Radio at the time and had previously served as Head of Light Entertainment as well as Controller of Radio 2 and Radio 4. I have a feeling he was deep in management hell at that time. He left the BBC about 10 years ago and worked for the National Consumer Council before he retired.

Judging from my hairstyle I wasn't too bothered that I was experiencing a potentially historical moment in my professional life. However, I remember that that I was aware that I was in the presence of an empire's fading glory.

David Hatch left an indelible impression on me throughout my broadcasting career and also delighted many radio listeners through his contributions as producer of I'm Sorry, I'll Read That Again and Just a Minute.