Killing them softly

In October I spent some days in Malta. One sunny Sunday morning I decided to go to a fisherman's village Marsaxlokk (to be read Marsa-shlok) mainly because of its name (don't you like the 'x' in the middle of the word and on top of that it is read as 'sh') but also because of the guide's promise that the world's best fish market takes place on Sundays there.

The evening before there was a huge rain in Valletta which actually means Malta as there is little else in Malta outside Valletta. The rain was so serious that coming back from a Saturday outing with Venelina and Dora I was afraid that the water would get into the car and we would drift away direction Africa.

The morning after was as fresh as if no deluge had threatened to wipe the island the night before. Sometimes nature is so innocent and oblivious of what it had previously inflicted or at least pretends to be totally innocent. It was naughtily offering people a gentle African breeze.

The only sign of the rain in Martaxlokk were the huge puddles which were quickly evaporating in front of the eyes of Sunday morning coffee-drinkers. Evaporating puddles always remind me of childhood Sliven, the thrill to get out of home after being forced to hide during a summer rain. The only drawback was the fact that the leather ball would get into the water and become really heavy.

View of Martaxlokk port

I find that the Martaxlokk fishermen found a really cute colour combination for their boats. It fits so well the stone of the village houses.

The gentle killer boats

No matter how gentle the boats look like they have hidden killer properties and are actually there to bring those guys below to the tables in a non-living state.

Scampi anyone?

Hecatombe 1

Hecatombe 2

Hecatombe 3

Hecatombe 4

Hecatombe 5

A stone's throw away from Africa - Malta

Two months ago I was lucky to spend several days in Malta - a place that had always attracted me by its marginal geographical position and its yellow stones seen on pictures.

Just as an orientation, Malta's history is linked to Carthage, Rome, the Arabs, the Phoenicians, the Kingdom of Sicily, the Knights of St. John, the French and the British.

Valetta is fantastic as seen from a boat in the bay. It looks haughty and inaccessible, strangely austere in its warm colours. The trips takes you to a cholera hospital, run down custom houses, magnificent palaces....

View of Valetta from the port

The two pictures below can give you the impression of the many nooks and crannies hidden in the wide Valetta port. One wouldn't have a problem finding a parking place for one's boat which is not the case for one's car.

Valetta or Sanglea or Vittoriosa (they are all linked anyway)

Fort St Angelo seen from Valetta

A place not to miss on Malta is the inner city of Mdina and its suburb Rabat. They say it was built by the Phoenicians who obviously preferred to stay away from the coast. Too vulnerable to the pirates I guess...

Mdina, the old capital

The small towns adjoining Valetta - Sanglea and Vittoriosa - are of particular interest at dusk and before storm when water is motionless.

Martaskala and Marsaxlokk were two happy fishing villages on a Sunday morning late October. The African sun dries the puddles from the evening rain and caresses the men sitting in cafes enjoying the renovated waterside in Martaskala and the cute white benches. Who said EU funding doesn't have an impact?

Martaskala

Although we looked hard for it we couldn't find a nice piece of coast. If I go back to Malta it will not be to the seaside but rather to Valetta. And of course, to confirm the cliche, we immediately ran into a bird shooting party. If you don't know local people are famous for shooting the birds that migrate from Europe to Africa and vice versa. Pretty mean I would say but maybe they also have their justification.

However, imagine that you are a tired bird finally seeing a piece of land. You hear the sound of your brothers and sisters (which are actually recorded), you get closer and you get a bullet.

Malta West Coast

Another disappointment was that no one was spared the 1990s and 2000s building spree damages. The empty apartments are in the thousands and they are simply not nice unlike the great old yellowish houses that were pulled down to make space for the new monstrosities with a sea view. Business and economic growth can't be an excuse here.

Grey Economy of Ourselves

A couple of days ago I stayed at my friends Adriana and Robert's place in Brussels and we had a good long conversation watered with Beaujolais Nouveau and Hungarian palinka. Staying without work for several weeks some years ago Robert was testing people's reaction by telling them that he was taking care of his kids when answering questions on occupation. Surprised reactions made him think how much we are associated and somehow defined and unjustly framed with what we are doing as a profession.

Some time ago I came upon a quote from Nietzsche Untimely Meditations: How we labour at our daily work more ardently and thoughtlessly than necessary to sustain our daily life because to us it is even more necessary not to have leisure to stop and think. Haste is universal because everyone is in flight from herself; universal also is the shy concealment of this haste because everyone wants to seem content and would like to conceal more sharp-eyed observers......."

I think Nietzsche got it right: we are afraid of ourselves and the emptiness that lack of haste and full occupation could possibly reveal. Life is easy when we are busy, we have a reference point, a business card, a story to tell. We also have deadlines, direction, schedules, pressure. Where are we? Is our character defined by how well we keep our deadlines, how organised we are to deliver what we produce: knowledge or cars. Is our smartness proven by the quantity of products we sell or our inventiveness by the advertising lines.

Gulag labour

I think Nietzsche was feeling that modern society was speeding up and the faster we go, the more we lose ourselves.

It is obvious that there is time needed for just being, for watching the sky 'that will be there after us', for looking for little gems crystallized in our loneliness and silence or in other words: facing ourselves, the fears, the unpleasant truths and the beauty. There is a need for an entire, legitimate identity outside of the regular economy, a grey economy of ourselves (not to be understood as valuation of house work).

On the other hand, I am convinced that what we do is important. I disagreed with my friends Dimitar and Irina when during a discussion in Greece they stated that work doesn't matter and it is a means and not an end. We should not seek escape in work but it seems to me that those who can should try to prove a point in life through work, to make a little difference. I realise this is a luxury but those who can - should afford it.

Only in this way, a compromise can be found between Nietzsche's constant escape from ourselves and the imperatives of modern society.

Courbet comes to Frankfurt

Two days ago I was walking in Frankfurt on a warm October evening when I noticed that there is an exhibition of Gustave Courbet. I had seen some of his paintings before and I was quite excited to see a dedicated exhibition.

I went out an hour and a half later quite excited by his paintings and personality. Later I found online those paintings which impressed me the most.

I would start with a theatrical ‘Portrait of a Desperate Man’ which he painted in his late 20s while passing through an existential crisis. One can see that his hands are not relaxed but quite tense as if he wants to pull out his hair. There is a look of desperation and surprise in his eyes by what is happening to him. However, he is defying destiny and his force of character transpires. He is also trying to remove his hair from his eyes as if he is trying to look better and deeper into himself.

Portrait of a Desperate Man

The ‘Desperate Man on the Verge of an Abyss’ is in the same category. This is again a self-portrait from the same period of his life. The posture of the body is a artificial defying the laws of physics. It seems to me that this is a deliberately sought effect illustrating the dramatism of his state of mind. There is a similar look of terror and defiance at the same time.

Portrait of a Desperate Man on the Verge of an Abyss

I liked quite a lot ‘Jo, the Beautiful Irish Girl’ painted in 1866. While very often the female beauty idea has changed beyond recognition during the years this one is surprisingly modern. The woman is watching herself in the mirror but this is obviously not an act of vanity as vanity implies a temporary oblivion of the passage of time and the ephemeral beauty. While realizing the perfection of her traits and the exquisiteness of her hair Jo is conscious of the passage of time – fact that makes her endlessly sad. She might also be missing her faraway beloved realizing that beauty loses its force and fades away if not actively contemplated.

Jo, the Beautiful Irish Girl

The Happy Lovers is a touching painting. Courbet did not have a family and it seems his love life was a series of disappointments. I have the feeling that this painting is more of a dream rather than a depiction of a common state of affairs. Although this is a self-portrait the man resembles strikingly the representations of Jesus. Probably this is a deliberate effect conveying the idea of the ultimate innocence of the happy lovers. However, despite being in a blissful state both of them are in separate universes – a transition phase to primordial loneliness.

The Happy Lovers

At first the Clairvoyant or the Sleepwalker scared me a bit because of her piercing look and her expressive forehead. It seems to me that people with such open foreheads possess extraordinary intelligence or at least sensitivity. Her face has a strange triangular form because of the slightly displaced perspective as the observer looks a bit from above. Her plaits resemble snakes. After looking at her a bit longer the fear disappears and the layer of aggressiveness is peeled off from the portrait and she is left alone with her utmost fragility.

The Clairvoyant