One understands the discomfort of those who complain that in the preparations being carried out for feasts and national occasions, the symbols and usages that brought them close to the life of people in olden days are increasingly being downplayed. Like for instance with this year’s Christmas edition of postage stamps.
I can hardly be accused of being religious (or a religious fanatic) but I still am sorry to note that elements of celebrations which I remember from past days are being replaced. And not just for Christmas. Here in Malta the arrival of the Three Kings is no longer celebrated; as I remember, it used to mark the end of Christmas holidays and a return back to school. Or the custom of growing corn in the dark (ġulbiena), or in November, the presentation of a bag with nuts for St Martin’s Day.
The discomfort does not simply arise from a sense of nostalgia, though admittedly this is also part of the problem. One feels also dissatisfaction with the fact that as a result of globalisation, old customs are being replaced by imported ways of doing things that are/will be driven by a tremendous marketing effort riding on enormous profits.
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ARCHIVES
The work accomplished over the years at the National Archives is impressive, as can be realized even by somebody who has been observing only from a distance what has been going on there, and still is. At last, we have an institution which reflects continuously on the values of our identity and of Maltese history and which acts effectively to ensure that they are being protected and appreciated.
What I like too in what is being done is that an innovative approach has been adopted to conserve what needs conserving. Not just the facts, the episodes and the environments relating to the “past” reality of influential people but equally the aspects of everyday life of the lower classes, of the “humble” people – where and how they lived, as well as their popular culture.
Keeping a focus, as I believe is being done, on a record of how the Maltese rural and physical environment has changed with time, is also a good idea. Once I dreamt of a project that could be set up by which during every decade, a visual record of Malta as a whole would be organised and archived so that ongoing developments would be on record decade by decade...
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COURT REFORMS
For how long are we going to be told stories about the reforms that must be done in the law courts – mostly in statements made by ministers and ex-judges? When shall we begin to hear about reforms that have been implemented and are giving results? Every month if not more often we listen to statements of the first kind, never to anything of the second.
Instead we discover every time some new reason to explain why the courts keep functioning with delays and hiccups. There are not enough court rooms. Not enough judges and magistrates. Not enough facilities. Not enough judicial assistants to do research work required by judges and magistrates. There’s no computerised system to cover this or that sector. Procedures are not effective and uptodate...
What else remains to be listed as insufficient in quantity or effectiveness?