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The Voic(edr iivoenf b yt thhe evo iicMe of aiitsl retaedesrse ) Issue Fortnightly magazine for the Diaspora August 20, 2019 210 Fortnightly magazine for the Diaspora MMeelllliieeħħaa BBaayy (also known as Għadira Bay) -- MMaallttaa’’ss mmoosstt ppooppuullaarr ssaannddyy bbeeaacchh 2 The Voice of the Maltese Tuesday August 20, 2019 TNhe firsta of at seriieso of arnticlesa abolut t hed Maltieseg herones whio gtavye thei r aVll so tihatv our haome - Malta! land in the Mediterranean could become what it is today. A history to be proud of, and to celebrate, and one that must recognise the magnificent contribution made by our ancestors. Immigration and hen I first came to Aus - to me. In feeling this way I Assimilation: tralia as a 12-year-old, I know I was not alone amongst did my very best to as - my compatriots in the Maltese similate into the dominant Anglo based Australian com - Diaspora. munity. I didn't want tWo stand out as a 'foreigner' and Many of us felt this way, per - especially not as one from an origin in the Southern haps ashamed of our language Mediterranean region. and our national background. I desperately wanted to belong and felt that there was re - We didn't know enough about ally nothing of any value in my 'wog' background that our origins to feel that sense of Andy Busuttil would be appreciated by my newfound countryfolk. Worst pride in our homeland and, still, I did not believe in my own value as a Maltese na - more importantly, a sense of tional. pride in ourselves. I did not adequately understand the history of our people We tended to approach our new homeland and its people and the extraordinary contributions we had made over the from a subservient position rather than one of equality and millennia to the history of the world. pride in ourselves. We often reacted with physical violence Consequently the value of our history and of the people when called 'wogs' but I wonder if we ever truly believed who had constructed that history, the Maltese, was also lost that the denigration was not justified. Language and Cultural Identity: Language is the basis of cultural identity. When a language dies, the culture dies with it. When a language is oppressed, it is a direct reflection of the fact that people are oppressed. Il-Malti, Maltese, is the national lan - guage of our homeland, and a co-offi - cial language of the country alongside English, but first and foremost Mal - tese is the 'first' language. The Maltese language only became the 'first' language of our homeland with the coming of independence in 1964. Up until that point English and Maltese were given as the dominant languages with English the prevailant language. After independence, Mal - tese was declared as the national lan - guage and mentioned as the dominant The Siege of Malta (1565): The capture of St Elmo by Matteo Perez d’Aleccio (c. 16th Cent.) language. The language of the Courts especially in the English speaking na - connection would give me. also became the Maltese language. tions, we cringed away from our back - The outcome for me was quite ex - Prior to the establishment of English grounds and only celebrated those traordinary and will be explained as a first language, from the earliest things we held culturally dear in the later in this series. I was extremely times of Knights' domination, Italian privacy and sanctity of our own lucky in that the doorway to this re- was the dominant language. It was the homes. We became 'converted' to the connection was provided by my love rising of Fascism in 1934 that saw it di - dominant culture and, wherever pos - and practice of music. minish. sible, encouraged our children to emo - The Pride of Malta: We can still see the influence of Ital - tionally and psychologically leave ian even in our national remembrance Malta for good. As a child growing up in Malta the days: Sette Giugno, (7th June) for ex - The consequences of this for my gen - history books always focused on the ample. We could also see it in the eration of immigrant were severe and grand achievements during The Great naming of our streets, which moved perhaps will remain with us for the Ottoman Siege of Malta (L-Assedju l- from 'strada' to 'triq' once Prime Min - rest of our lives. Kbir) and the second Great Siege, that ister Dom Mintoff made the move I am speaking in generalities here which occurred during WWII when back to the traditions of the Maltese and using my own experience and my the Axis powers attacked Malta. language. memory of my earlier family life to However, the heroes of these events, This recognition of the relationship guide my recollections. However, it as reflected in the literature, were in - between language and identity was would be interesting to see how many evitably the Knights of St John and critical to the building of our own na - of you, the readers, would share these Great Britain respectively. The Maltese tional identity and, consequently, our recollections and experiences. people were portrayed as mere passen - own sense of dignity. At one stage, not so long ago, I de - gers who seemed to do nothing more Our Cultural Cringe and Re-estab - cided that there was no point in dis - than wait for events to unfold and for lishing Relationship: tancing myself from my Maltese these horrendous events to be over. community here in Australia. I want- For those of us who were overseas, ed to re-connect and to see what that *Continued on page 3 Tuesday August 20, 2019 The Voice of the Maltese 3 *from page 2 When I was in both Primary and High school in Malta, Sette Giugno didn't come into my consciousness. Neither did the occupation of Malta by the In 1798 Grand Master French forces of Bonaparte in 1798 figure to any great extent either in my consciousness or ima- gination. Ferdinand von Hompesch I do remember some vague references to Hom - pesch (the Grand Master capitulated to the French and who capitulated to the French and left the Maltese to their fate under a tyrannical rule), but the real meaning of what colnese - fMta ltteseh ande pr ovMiding oaur lprtogeenitsors e to their fate quently happened was lost on my with greater educational and social op - young mind. portunities. However, Napoleon's con - At the time I didn't deeply realise that tinuing desire for expansion proved Hompesch had not only surrendered costly and consequently, the money Malta as a matter of principle, due to supply became constricted and so little the Knights' promise that they would came of these ideas and promises. never raise arms against another Chris - Instead, Napoleon's forces committed tian nation but he had done so in ex - the one crime that the Maltese found change for estates and pensions in intolerable. They began pillaging the France for himself and his Knights. He churches to obtain gold, silver and had, in effect, sold out the Maltese for other valuables to finance their cam - financial gain. paigns abroad. From a history that always recorded While this was not the only aspect of the bravery and stoicism of the their rule that the Maltese found ab - Knights, this was indeed an act of gross solutely objectionable it must have cowardice and one that betrayed the been close to the last straw for a popu - futures of their Maltese subjects. Judas lation that Iscariot must have been the inspiration had been behind this act! domi - Mind you, by the time Hompesch was nated and the Grand Master, the Knights were oppressed certainly not in the same league as for cen - those who had taken over Malta in turies. GM Ferdinand von Hompesch 1530. Hence the Their governance of the Islands had tyranny, of the French 'ħakkiema' or degraded to a point where the Maltese the pillag - occupiers. did not regard them with any sense of ing of the The consequence of French positive appreciation, respect or awe. churches, tyranny was an uprising by Regardless, Malta and the Maltese the op - thousands of Maltese, were seen as mere possessions to be ac - pressive loosely described as 'irregu - quired (in the case of the Knights for regime lars' who blockaded and the price of a bird!), utilised and then and their then besieged the French in sold off or abandoned when they were broken Valetta. These 'irregulars' no longer of sufficient use or, as was promises were, in the main, Maltese the case with the Knights at the time of to the peasantry armed with pis - Napoleon, when it was no longer expe - Maltese tols, muskets and farming dient to remain. people, tools. The leadership came from It is true that the French did come in led to the Emmanuele Vitale with grand ideas about liberating the undoing the better-educated groups and included Emmanuele Napoleon Bonaparte arriving to start Vitale, a notary, Vincenzo Borg, a mer - the occupation of Malta on June 9, 1798 chant and a clergyman by the name of Francesco Caruana. They must be named and their names not forgotten. It was not the first time that Maltese 'ir - regulars' had featured powerfully in our history. However, inevitably they were always referred to dismissively, in this rather disparaging way. Earlier I mentioned Sette Giugno and what it now appears to mean to many Maltese around the World. This, of course, is the celebration of the mem - ory of the many thousands of Maltese who rose up against the unfairness of the British rulers, and the greed of a number of merchants who were taking advantage of the poverty and depriva - tion of the working class Islanders, in particular, of the time.

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