Holiday ~ Looking back IV, Lazy Sunday

I'm beginning to think that maybe I should have made some notes while I was away so that I could make my account a little more accurate, but hey if I make a couple of little errors there are only two of us who will know, and the overall story won't be so different.

So if I remember correctly Sunday wasn't quite such a nice day weather wise, temperatures only in the low 20sC, none the less we had a swim and a nice relaxed day.   The sight seeing we were planing involved churches so it seemed best to leave that for another day.

To be perfectly honest I can'r remember that much about the day but since this photo was taken then we must have spent at least some time drinking coffee on the balcony.   I do know that that evening we had a nice dinner of some traditional Maltese dishes, I stuck with fish as I love fish but don't eat nearly as much as I would like to at home.

It was also around Sunday that I realised that we were starting to fall into the stereotypical gender roles, some of which (like being bought dinner and not having too carry the shopping) I was quite happy with.   However it was a little disconcerting that waiters automatically assumed that Bob would choose and check the wine, as well as be given the bill.

GRRRRRRR

Just to break into all these wonderful frothy holiday memories, I want to have a quick rant.   I have only been back from holiday a couple of hours and already I'm exasperated with London drivers.   I can deal with nasty aggressive little s*%#s who barge into the front of queues or pimply oiks who carve me up.   I know that they only do this because they feel that certain parts of their anatomy are too small, and I suspect that they are right.

It is the total inconsiderate nature of some drivers, whether double parking their Chelsea Tractor to drop Damian or Samantha off at school or the idiot who decides that the A23 is a good pace to do a three point turn. I am staggered that I don't see more accidents, it can only be the alertness and the avoiding actions from the rest of us that stop the whole system gumming up to a total stand still.

If it was not so expensive I would star carrying copies of the "Highway Code" around with me to hand out in the hope that I might be able to show these selvish wastes of skin the error of their ways.   How did these people ever pass a driving test?

OK Rant over back to holiday snaps tomorrow.

Holiday ~ Looking back III, Pastizzi for Breakfast.

Saturday dawned early, around an hour earlier than my body was really expecting it as their clocks are an hour ahead of ours.   Having said that I had enjoyed a decent night's sleep and was already benefiting from being away, so I got up and went for a walk to get breakfast.   I don't know if it is a big thing in Malta but whenever I visit I always like to have Pastizzi for breakfast.

Pastizzi are the traditional Maltese street food.   Sold from small shops or booths around the islands alongside pizza, pies, and pasties a real mixture of the Mediterranean and British cultures that show everywhere from the architecture, the food and even the language.  English is still a joint national language alongside Maltese, until just a few years ago speaking Maltese in public was seen to be a bit uncouth, and something the aspiring middle classes would never do, now I find I am hearing more and more as the Maltese reassert there own identity.

Saturday was a lovely day so we had a walk around and spent a little time by the pool, generally being lazy and just enjoying the locality, and other local specialities.

Holiday ~ Looking back II, a room with a view

I had pre warned the "Hotel" where we had our apartment that despite my official paperwork I would be travelling in the name of Paula so it was no surprise to them when I checked in, and no surprise that they took it in their stride.   The paperwork was quickly processed and we went straight up to the apartment.   These apartments sleep four, there is a bedroom with twin beds, a bathroom, a galley kitchen and a lounge/dining room with a fold down double bed.

The view from our balcony

We shared the bedroom but it soon became clear that I was going to dominate this room, with two jackets, three dresses a couple of pairs of trousers and some tops I used the lion's share bit of the hanging space and my pots, potions, smellies, make up and bling took up nearly all of the surface of the dressing table, while Bob more or less lived out of his (rather capacious) suitcase.

At this point we were planning to eat out each night so we only had a very little shopping to do, just the essentials, milk, tea, coffee, beer, and wine.   After laying in these supplies we were ready for our diner and popped out to La Stalla, a local restaurant where we enjoyed a nice meal with a decent bottle of local wine.   When I first visited Malta back in the 1980s the wine left much to be desired, things like subtlety, taste, and smoothness, in those days the local wine had colour and alcohol,  these days either they are a whole lot better (while still pretty cheap) or my palate is shot to pieces.

We decided that we would return to the apartment for coffee on our balcony, and ended up staying up longer than we had planned talking long into the night.

Holiday ~ Looking Back I; Many Firsts

I can't help but notice that I managed an awful lot of posts about looking forward to my holiday, well you can anticipate at least as many, but probably more looking back.   I have only been back in Blighty for a few hours but already I recognise a couple of themes from the week, the main one being a week of firsts.   I won't go into all of them now but instead will try to start at the beginning, or maybe even slightly before that.

We flew out on Friday morning, that meant most of my preparation and virtually all of my packing had to be completed on Thursday evening.   Not sure what was most amazing, that I managed to pack everything I wanted into one case (and hand luggage) or that I was within the weight limit of 20kg.   While I was packed and ready when my friend (I will call him Bob because he was) arrived to pick me up.   I would have liked to have had more time to clean up before leaving, but at least I had fed the fish and washed up.

The first first of the week was going to be the air travel.   It has to be stated (or maybe it doesn't but I'm going to anyway) that I was "flying pretty" but all the paperwork had to be in my legal (male) name, also that Bob is just a friend.   Check in went fine, with no issues around any difference between my presentation and my paperwork, but that was the first of many times that we were assumed to be "a couple".    Next came security, inevitably I did set off the alarms and had to go through the full body scanner  and get a pat down.   All the way through I was treated with respect, referred to as madam and the pat down was conducted with respect but efficiently by the female officer.

As with everything else the flight when pleasantly enough and was pretty uneventful, arriving at Luqa airport we bought our duty free supplies for the week and passed through passport control to collect our luggage.   A small piece of glee to start the holiday off well when the Malta passport officer looked at my passport and started to say that I had given him  my "husband's passport by mistake", then half way through looked at Bob (six foot five and black hair) looked back at the photo and realised. He had the good grace to look a little sheepish and did the classic "oh, right yes, erm thank you Miss"

Honey! I'm Home

I have just returned home after my little holiday, happy and refreshed but a little tired from the travelling.   S this is just to say I am looking forward to catching up with all my friend's Blogs, starting to record a few here from my holiday and to generally catch up with life in the UK

But before any of that, I need to make a trip to Tescos to lay in some supplies, unpack do the laundry and the myriad of other things that need to be done.

I promise, more will follow.

Poppies

Here in the UK and the Commonwealth the Poppy has become a symbol of remembrance, based on the flanders poppies they have been adopted across the country since the initial Poppy Day on Remembrance day, the 11th November 1921.   Since then every year the British Legion have sold their paper poppies to both raise funds and aid remembrance every November.

In my memory during the 1960s the act of remembrance was pretty much universal, those who couldn't attend a ceremony would still stop all activities during the minutes silence.   We would hold an act of remembrance at my Church and as the silence fell all the traffic outside would stop and a general silence would fall so much so that we could clearly hear the minute guns firing miles away in Hyde Park.   In later decades the whole remembrance thing seemed to wane as less and less people could remember going to war, or people who went to war, then in the 90s it started to come back, and is now a very big thing.

Through out all this time I have always bought my Poppy and worn it throughout the week leading up to remembrance day Sunday (or if it is the Sunday before the 11th then from then till the 11th)   As this year is the centenary of the outbreak of the First World War there have been a lot of poppies around, I worry that for some this is almost a celebration, some sort of jingoistic looking back to when "We won the war" I will be wearing my poppy for one week in November, I will not be wearing it with pride, I will be wearing it as a sign of my support for those who were injured and sign of my remembrance of those fell, not just the British in the that awful First World War, but all those wh have died on all sides in all wars.

Brighton

Two trips to Brighton, two very different looks

Hope

How I hope I'm spending my time

How I hope I'm NOT looking

Truth

They say that honesty is always the best policy, I'm not so sure, maybe the truth but rarely the whole truth.

Unusually for me I would like simply quote at length from the novel I'm currently reading.

"Truth is female, since truth is beauty rather than handsomeness; this Ridcully reflected as the Council grumpled in., would certainly explain the the saying that a lie could run around the world before Truth had got it's, correction, her boots on, since she would have to choose which pair - the idea that any woman in a position to choose would have just one pair of boots being beyond rational belief. Indeed as a Goddess she would have lots of shoes, and thus many choices: comfy shoes for home truths, hobnail boots for unpleasant truths' simple clogs for universal truths and possibly some sort of slipper for self evident truth.   More important right now was what kind f truth he was going to have to impart to his colleagues, and he decided not on the whole truth, but instead nothing but the truth, which dispensed with the need for honesty"

from Unseen Academicals by Terry Pratchet