During a renaming of streets ceremony that took place in City Hall last 10 October, Mayor Bloomberg spent a considerable time speaking about Malta and his personal connection with Malta. The area opposite the Maltese Centre in Astoria, Queens has been renamed “Malta Square” following a motion introduced by Councilman Peter Vallone on behalf of the Maltese living in New York.
Introduced by Councilman Peter Vallone as “a person who has a soft spot for the Maltese people”, Mayor Bloomberg, recounted travelling to Malta after getting married to visit his late in-laws who had retired in Malta. Describing Malta as a “tiny country, mostly rock, where you’ve never seen anything like this”, he speaks about a famous picture he saw of an impressive Valletta harbour during the war. British, French, US, and the surrendered Italian and German battleships were stacked besides each other in the Grand Harbour, saying that “it was most probably the highest concentration of military ships in the world”. Mayor Bloomberg concluded by saying that “Malta is a very nice country, people couldn’t be nicer. It's a blend of Italian and North African cultures, its very Catholic, they have there own ways of expressing their Catholicism. If you ever want a vacation for a few days, I’m telling you, you’d find it fascinating", concluded the Mayor.
AmCham Malta took this opportunity to write to Mayor Bloomberg and thank him for speaking so highly about Malta and the Maltese people. AmCham Malta formally invited the Mayor to visit Malta in the near future and experience the giant leaps forward the country has made since his visit to Malta some 40 years ago.
Malta, the letter states, is today not only a great tourist destination but also a regional hub in the Mediterranean for sophisticated industries as ICT and financial services. AmCham Malta congratulated Mr Anthony Curmi, ex-President of the Maltese Centre in New York, who was the initiator of the idea to name the area “Malta Square”. The video of the ceremony can be found in the Blue Room section of the City’s official website www.nyc.gov