My search for my father and family has taken me some time with considerable help from so many kind Maltese friends.

I say friends as many are people I haven’t even met personally but the care and consideration is that I have never experienced from relative strangers but only from close friends.

So I feel I am not overstating matters.

But my search has been for my father primarily and secondly for relatives.

I placed many letters to the editor in various newspapers and it seems at last to have borne fruit.

As I live between two countries I gave my brother’s phone number in the newspaper and he received a call from a Michael Zammit.

It is clear having now spoken to him that he is 100 per cent my father’s youngest brother and of course my uncle.

However, the bad news is my father died in 1996 aged 69. This is very sad for us but it offers closure on the unknown and we can now get to know who our father was.

It however opens up a whole new line of relatives and this is what we must now concentrate on.

There is also another Uncle named Anthony Zammit who sadly has also passed away but there are other relatives I have yet to meet or know about. So now I know we were named after our uncles and not a random selection. Strange how something so small has a completely unexpected significance.

It’s been an amazing year 2008 and seems that 2009 will be too.

I am looking to book a flight to return to Malta in the next few days.

But the work and help given to follow other avenues have not been wasted as they kept me focused on this difficult search. To find a relative with no date of birth but just a vague idea of age was never an easy task and only the hope that something would eventually work and so much sustained support kept me going.

I look forward to meeting up with you all and of course meeting my relatives and extended family.

After my recent visit I found Malta to hold for me what I had been seeking in many countries and it is here I wish to find a home so if I have time I will be looking at that aspect.

It’s not possible to find a single word or phrase that sums up how I feel regarding the kindness shown to me but if there is an elusive phrase out there that’s the one I wish to use.

Until I find it I have to settle with thanking you all from my heart.

Michael Zammit

Bournemouth, Dorset

England