Election celebration fever in Valletta and dead fish

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Today I witnessed the sheer joy of people when their chosen political party has won. It was a pleasure to see people care about the democratic process and their excitement when it goes their way. I wish it was like that in the UK! But not all of Malta was partying, the early morning market was still set up in Marsaxlokk although some vendors packed up at 11am, maybe to celebrate when the news came in I wonder?

After yesterday's huge lie-in until 8am, I decided that we needed to put in more effort today and get up at 7am. I regretted this later as I was actually dreaming about kittens when the alarm woke me. There is a genuine reason for this early rising on a Sunday; we were going to the fish market in Marsaxlokk which is down on the south-west coast of Malta and we are staying in the north-east.

I'm still not used to the driving here, more often than not there are no road markings so I'm not always sure if I'm on a dual carriageway or a very wide road. I get the impression that the roads here are just old paths that were covered in tarmac when cars were invented rather than planned routes for automobiles.

Arriving in Marsaxlokk at 9am, there already was nowhere to park, so again, like Rabat in Gozo yesterday, I had to park on the outskirts and we walked in. As promised on TripAdvisor, there were plenty of bobbing traditional Maltese fishing boats in the harbour and lots of market stalls. Every now and then there were fish stalls with the vendors wafting the flies away. The fish stands were intermittent with other wares so I do wonder if clothing was bought, when gotten home if it stank of fish? I am a vegetarian and pretty squeamish about looking at dead bodies, but I still found it interesting despite a bit yuk. Glyn wasn't too happy, he wanted fish-throwing like you get in Seattle.

It was an hubbub of tourists and locals all looking for bargains; a mix of standard marketware plus tourist tat, with the occasional artist hawking Maltese style paintings. Also there were African guys selling wooden animals and colourful bamboo bowls with domed nets to keep flies off your room temperature food - Glyn bought one of those. We also got some fridge magnets and other important stuff.

Passing by a small kiosk, two women shouted to us asking if we fancied a harbour boat trip. Go on then. They seemed taken aback at how easy that was. A bargain at €4, a small fishing boat with only three other tourists and a fisherman telling us about the harbour. There was a tunnel that went all the way to Valetta, lots of fish farms and not so old relics of English snobbery from around WW2; the remains of a swimming pool, old bar and a hotel that the Maltese built but only the English were allowed to use. Typical.

Afterwards we carried on through the market where I bought a bra (a size 12 being XXL, thanks a bunch Malta) and then a very cheap bottle of Maltese wine. Now maybe it's not dodgy but it literally was out of the back of a van. Plus all the bottles were varying in shape and size, some being similar to family sized vegetable oil bottles, all coated in thick dust. I've not tried it yet and hopefully I won't go blind, but at €1.50, who could resist?

The drive back up to Valletta got increasingly noisy as motorists were randomly honking their horns for excessive amounts of time. Many were decorated with huge flags - this was the start of the celebration of the snap election yesterday and by lunchtime the Maltese knew that their Labour Party had been re-elected. The closer we got to Valletta, the noisier it got and I saw a few flares up in the sky. I saw old women dancing in the street and waving flags, trucks full of people in red t-shirts waving and shouting happily. Drivers honking at each other and playing music loudly.

Arriving in Valletta we actually paid for a carpark for once and walked into the main drag where there many people of all ages making noise and we could hear loud music playing across the historic town. Labour Party flags were hanging out of the window and people were cheering. It was an amazing atmosphere and it made me feel a bit sad because we don't get this back home: the majority bizarrely just don't think politics and elections affect them and so there's no passion. In Malta they seem to appreciate their democracy but Glyn and I did wonder where the people who voted for the opposition were as there was no sign of anyone complaining about all the noise.

We went to the Malta Experience as I had good memories of it from 15 years ago. It turned out to be a 45 minute historical movie about the Island which was very informative but Glyn and I struggled to stay awake - probably due more to the late nights and early mornings more than anything. It was interesting, especially the times during the World Wars where Malta suffered and starved because of multiple bombings being in such a strategic place.

The aircon was a great relief after half a day of scorching sun and the ticket did include a tour of the Sacra Infermeria which was a state of the art medical facility in medieval times run by the Knights of St John. It did look a nice places to stay (for those times) with massive wards and each bed with it's own private privy. But they only treated men! This was because the Knights of St John swore an oath of chastity which strangely made it impossible to treat women. Things are different nowadays and thankfully doctors are able to treat people of another gender without shagging them. The guide told us not to be worried about the partying noise outside, it was all safe and friendly, were she not working she would be out there making noise too.

The Infermeria was huge and is now a conference hall where the president does important stuff when other world leaders put in an appearance. Bush signed a peace treaty with Gorbachev in the main hall and the British Royal family have also shown their horse-like faces there.

As the UK is such a 7 days a week place, I often forget that other countries have Sundays off and so apart from the election partying, not a lot was happening in Valetta. After 2.30pm, bars and restaurants were closing and in between the shouting cars and music it was very quiet. We thought maybe go back to Qawra for a swim and organise tomorrow's trip to Comino. We had originally booked a three islands trip online that included Comino, but they cancelled it due to transport staff not working on Monday because of the election. They offered to rearrange on Tuesday but the internet says it will rain then, so I declined. (For my blog on Comino, wait until tomorrow - it needs to happen first!).

Stopping in a shop to buy water, Glyn and I asked if people were waiting for anything in particular. Apparently the President was going to walk with his family down the Main Street today but it was postponed until tomorrow morning. The people in the street didn't seemed perturbed and were partying nonetheless. As we got closer to our car, the area became more like a music festival with much flag waving, red t-shirts and smiling police. One copper was on a Segway, - get in, I'd join the police if I got my own Segway! We photographed the people celebrating and felt lucky to be able to witness the joy - the dancing, singing, hugging and lots of airhorns. Really, LOTS of airhorns.

I was so glad that Glyn was driving because the traffic was an utter nightmare. There were many floats of people boozing to loud pop music. I did wonder if there was one radio station that all were all tuned into or if a Malta Election Celebration soundtrack was available for download? I wouldn't be surprised, after all it's amazing that this election was only called 4 weeks ago yet 1000s of flags, t-shirts and red shiny hats were available in time for today. There was even a woman giving away airhorns beside the road, because we all have spare airhorns to give away. The chaos went on for miles and due to google maps hating us, we drove in many circles extremely slowly. There was one point in all street dancing that I spotted three miserable looking men on a bench - ah these are the guys who voted for the opposition! Every step of the way was partying, flags flapping out of cars and boots open with people hanging out precariously but cheering. We saw people dancing on cars and they were happy to pose for photos when I pointed my camera at them. Even the police when waving us through the traffic were cheerful.

Now there were a few ambulances trying to get through; given the crush, it was a miracle they managed although it was scarily close at one point. We also saw one pick-up truck of revellers tail-gating an ambulance to get through the traffic. Let's be honest, we all have fantasised about doing this but I've never actually seen anyone do it before. Eventually we found an open road but a journey that should have taken 20 minutes took 1 hour and 45.

In Qawra, there were still a few truck driving flag wavers, but it was minimal. We booked a trip for Comino tomorrow and there was no mention of the election stopping it thankfully. After all that driving we'd had enough so Glyn consulted TripAdvisor for a local place that served Maltese food. Just like us we walked straight past it, got annoyed (we spotted it on the way back) and found another place, one lone guy who wanted no more than two sets of customers at a time. The food was great, the service friendly and a wonderful end to a great day.

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