Desperate and daring, I have searched the fellow minnows of Europe to play a little mental game of many ifs and no fewer buts. Would they, or would they not have been so profligate with the public purse? Various real – some would say surreal – scenarios from home relocated to same-size or even smaller territories and peoples, all of which a part of the process of the affirmation of a national identity.

I have tried Gibraltar. It is smaller but, at least according to the vibes I got in cyberspace, they seem to be a sensible lot, the Gibs, despite a predominance of familiar Maltese surnames.

I have tried Liechtenstein. They are smaller too, but they still seem to be doing well with their banking and financial empires.

I have tried Andorra. They are much smaller, but I daresay there is a tourism lesson or two to be learnt there.

I have tried Iceland. Demographically smaller and most definitely cooler, but even given their recent economic nightmares, we cannot even remotely hope to emulate them, at least not in the foreseeable future.

I have tried so-called ‘boring’ Luxembourg. They are smaller too, but seem a lot more prone to perform well within the EU and the major international economic fora.

I have also tried the republic of San Marino and the principality of Monaco. They are much smaller, but any comparison here would be, well, odiously unfair to us from the very start. They are simply far too ahead of us.

And of course I have tried the Vatican. It is smaller in territorial and demographic terms, but in this case it makes sense to stop here. Not with the Pope, its head of state, happily among us. And what of that Nostradamus prediction one could one day move lock, stock and golden barrel to the other, i.e. the exact opposite direction of this futile exercise?

You will have noticed that I have restricted myself to smaller-than-us nations elsewhere in Europe. I have purposely skipped Cyprus – slightly bigger, same EU age and practically running away with us on all levels: economy, infrastructure, culture and sport. And then there are hundreds of others all over the world, but I will spare you the misery.

Point one: I doubt there is even one of these fellow minnows that would have readily forked out the amount we have had spent on the celebrations to “inaugurate” one major square in our capital that has, after all, existed since the time Valletta was built by the Knights. Resurfacing a piazza and adding a few wooden benches, some unimpressive dancing water and two obnoxiously incompatible lampposts, certainly would not merit such fanfare, at least in these smaller countries.

Point two: It would even be more insulting if we thought they would be ready to make another PR splash in Valletta to mark – hold your breath – the re-opening of a public lavatory that has been restored in what used to be known in imperial days as ‘The Gut’. The Vatican did invite the world media when Michelangelo’s restored masterpiece in the Sistine Chapel was re-opened to the public, but the toilets were completely ignored, although cardinals too have to answer nature’s calls.

Incidentally, for the love of me, I still cannot see what the word “vagina” has in any way to do with the word “Valletta”, except that they both start with the letter V and are listed on a restored lavatory panel. Mind you, for different reasons they both can also be very enticing.

Point three: Then of course we have the roofless theatre that is to take the place of what once was a majestic theatre popular with opera lovers and composers before Hitler’s Stukas got to it during the last world war. That it has taken us this long to come up with something, even as pathetic as this, to replace the ruins is in itself a socio-political enigma worth a thousand university theses.

There are, in fact, those who believe there had been genuine hopes – entertained by some of our more enterprising politicians – that the Germans would oblige by sponsoring a project to undo the damage they caused to such a previously famous Valletta landmark. While our friends and then masters the British handed us an insignificant little medal, certainly not even their highest commendation and usually presented to individuals, our former enemies simply would not play ball.

So we are now stuck with something that not only makes no sense but is also to be further compounded by the erection of a new parliament building immediately one goes through a small breach in the bastions that is to play the part of a City Gate. Our best theatre people have already publicly declared their opposition to Renzo Piano’s roofless theatre. In his undoubtedly creative brain, there probably never was the awareness that this island, the island in Byron’s poem, is a cacophony of smells, yells and bells. Plus the fireworks that mostly occur when a roofless theatre can actually and practically be in use – the summer months.

It would be fun to continue which of those smaller-than-us nations would have had a government ready to ride roughshod over everybody else and still go ahead with the unpopular project. The same thing happened, by the way, in the mid-sixties, when a government of the same political persuasion chose to contract another famous Italian architect of the time to turn the old, elegant City Gate façade of the Knights and its immediate precincts into a garage complex.

Sadly, these are not, however, the fun and fête of the Small Nations’ Games, but public projects carried out with public funds accrued from public taxes. If that same public is to be ignored, then something is seriously wrong with our democratic values.

In the long term, the Bikini islanders in the Pacific, again a smaller nation, have had it better than us. Not only is the name associated with something more attractive than the Maltese cross, but they also have deservedly been compensated for the atrocious damages caused to them and their poor island-atoll by the world’s powers-that-be.

In contrast, we have been presented with Renzo Piano, today considered passé by most architecture experts and students, while over the decades they have had the likes of Brigitte Bardot and Gina Lollobrigida right down the Hollywood circuit to Pamela Anderson and Jennifer Aniston exploiting and fully exposing their inviting two-piece namesake.

Anyone for Snakes & Ladders?