Maltese roots

My name is Paula, I am 73 years old and I am sending this letter from Cornwall, in England.

I occasionally read Times of Malta online and have seen a couple of articles in recent times by Claudia Calleja that I found very interesting.

The first one was about C. Vella from Sliema and his memories of his childhood in the siege in World War II. The second was last week about Maurice Agius celebrating his 100th birthday. He also had his memories of the war.

I am writing with my father’s story. He too would have been 100 years old on March 19 this year but,  sadly, passed away in 2000.

His name was Christopher and he was born in Malta in 1921 to a Maltese mother (née Vella from Sliema) and a British soldier. He was the youngest of three children. When he was a baby, the family was posted to England. Sadly, my grandmother died of illness when dad was just 20 months old. She was only 28 years old.

My grandfather remarried and the family was posted to India where dad grew up until the age of 10 years. He could speak fluent Urdu. For some reason, the children were sent back to England, his elder brother joined the army aged 14 years and dad was looked after by an old lady. Living in the house next door was my mother and her parents. They became childhood friends and eventually, when the war was over, they married and, over the following years, had four children.

Dad joined the British army at 14 years of age as a drummer boy. In the war, he fought in the desert and then crossed to Malta and was there in 1941-42 and took part in defending the island.

On being demobbed, he  joined the British police force. He was a very good policeman, very fair and very well liked. When he retired as a sergeant in crime prevention, he had gained three commendations. I was very proud of him (still am).

He talked of visiting Malta but it sadly never happened. Like many people who took part in the war, he didn’t talk about it much. He didn’t know of any family still in Malta.

I only paid my first visit to the island in September 2019 and felt at home. My biggest regret is leaving it so long, through various circumstances over the years preventing it from happening. I had planned to make up for lost time when the pandemic hit us all.

As soon as possible, I will be back. Along with family members, we will  endeavour to continue to find any family connections we can. We all have Maltese citizenship and proud to being connected to such wonderful people and a beautiful country.

Paula Twist – Cornwall, England

Valletta residents’ parking problems

Cars parked along the Valletta ring road. Photo: Shutterstock.com

At present, we, the people living in Valletta, particularly on the Marsamxett side, are facing a parking problem.

During last week, every time I returned from work in the afternoon I never found a parking space, neither in the residential parking slots nor the others. As a result, I had to stay in the car and wait for someone to leave the city, sometimes for more than one hour. This is becoming unbearable indeed.

So, who is taking the parking spaces? Many. There are those people who do not live here but whose parents do and, surprisingly, have a permit. They park their car in the morning, go to work and, later, in the afternoon or evening, come for their car and go back home comfortably.

Then, there are those who simply have a residential parking permit because they have their parents living here, which is not right.

Some lawyers and businessmen/women who own offices and shops in Valletta also have parking permits. Moreover, the government is also adding to the problem; every ministry is increasing the number of parking spaces for its workers. If I am not mistaken, in the past there were only two parking spaces allotted to every ministry, one for the minister and another for the permanent secretary.

In front of the Ministry for European Affairs and Equality there are a lot of parking permits issued for the use of cranes and other machinery. The permits expire after six months and the parking spaces are taken up by normal vehicles every day.

Then there are the disability permits, which are being issued like pastizzi. I wonder what happened to the Valletta people – most of us becoming disabled! There are also Valletta residents who have a blue badge and are as fit as a fiddle.

All these farces must stop and be revised as Valletta residents have the right to have parking spaces in their hometown. More Valletta residents’ parking spaces (green spaces) must be added and those who work here and are not residents have to park their cars at the park and ride, nearby car parks or other parking spaces along the ring road. If not, they can use the national transport or the ferries like many do every day.

I urge the authorities and the local council to do something as we, the people of Valletta, must be respected and given preference to park in front of our residences as we live here.

Carlo Agius– Valletta

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