Ticking away...10 days to go

This is the season to be jolly fa la la la la la la la

I might add, this is the season to be stuffed, stuffed with all the food that I am going to eat. My Xmas party bash started last night with a meal with my MIRM mates. The meal was at Peppino's in Paceville. Food was good. Afterwards we had a couple of beers in the bars.

Today was my last day at work for the year. We finished early, at around 2pm and went off for lunch at Vino Veritas. Had a pizza with some wine. Tonight, I have a five course meal, courtesy of Alleance Francais. My god!

Tomorrow for lunch I am meeting my former geography mates. Then in the evening, I have a meal with Baanisuu's Uni mates.

Sunday and Monday are dedicated to our mates. We shall be hanging out together at the usual place. That means lots of food, lots of drink and lots of laughter.

Come Xmas day, another big meal. I can better define it a marathon meal. I am not exaggerating if I say that such meals at my aunt's may last up to almost six hours!

Then Boxing Day is another meal, the official meal with the 'marmalja'.

Jesus....that's so much of food.

Swansea on the way

In a recent post, Time to blog, I mentioned how I had the chance of going to Swansea, Wales for a 4-day planning workshop. I managed to secure a place and will fly off to Heathrow Airport on Sunday 2nd September. From there, the guys from the planningsummerschool will be there and take care of me for the rest of my stay in Wales.

Excellent.

I shall be coming back the following Saturday mid-afternoon. I shall go home change, grab my bag and drive to Gozo. Baanisuu and all our friends will be there. I shall stay there for I day.

Then Monday, back to work.

Xmas shutdown

Xmas came and passed, as did the year 2006. 2006 ended with a bang, a bad one, resulting from impropriate new arrivals. At the moment there is some uneasiness in the group, bad tidings arising from stupid actions. Grabbing attention is a way kids/young birds do to be fed, not adults (if they can be called adults).

Anyway, the Xmas shut down spanned 5 days where I did practically nothing, just ate, played PC games and hung out with Baanisuu and friends. No mention of MIRM or any assignment.

The New Year: First day was foody...lots of it. The second day was the perfect introduction to a new year thanks to HER. Day three, yesterday, slam back to life. Working for eight hours was not at all easy, doing an environmental chemistry assignment after that was even harder. Yes, I have to make up for the do-nothing period during Xmas. Plus I have exams in the last week of Jan. Which reminds me that I have no idea what it is goint to be all about; no clues from the secretary or admin.

What the steam is STEAM?

Steam is a gentlemen's club. First thoughts?

I had the opportunity to see what its like, what goes on in there last Friday. Last Friday, some friends of mine went to a bachelor's party, you know the last night out for soon-to-be-married guys.

Apart a good meal, our Bachelor, whom we dressed in a nappy with a huge dummy was totally annihalated with fresh cream in front of Havana, one of Malta's most popular nightclubs. Imagine the crowd....

After going to 7 Rooms and drinking an awful lot of vodka red bull, we went off to this Steammy thing.

Ok, so to enter you need to pay but we were special guests. The club itself is an 80s style place, with revolving globes and flashy lights, comfy sofas, lots of poles and the 'action section'. All over the place were foreign ladies, hardly dressed, talking to men looking for business.

The business was: OK you pay me Lm 5 min, and I lap pole dance in front of you, or lap dance with you 'privately' in the other section of the club. Oh and by the way, it is Lm 5 per song.

Now some maths, commercial song is on average 3 to 4 minutes long....WOW now that is some rate. Anyway, it seems that business is done with this rate since the girls are coming and going, talking to guys in the ear and convincing them off. Hit me if am wrong, but I estimate that my mates spent altogether around Lm 125 and we were 8, two of which, me and another did not bother.

My reason: you cannot touch, you cannot feel them, you cannot see it. She moves on you to make you crazy and to want more, so then another song passes... Guys guys there is the real thing.

And since you are actually doing nothing apart from getting horny and sweaty, does this qualify as an act of infedelity?

An italian guy in Malta (actually two)

I stayya ina bigga hotel...and the beds have no shiitss. Call the manager I ask him for a shiit on my bed..He tells me: go to da toilet you sonofabitch....

Here I am in Malta, actually at work during my lunchtime (yes, lunchtime for me is at 14:00). I wonder what my team mates are doing up there in France. I am sure they are enjoying themselves, but anyways, so did I the last few days.

I was on leave from the 17th and came back to work yesterday. Two Italian friends, Antonio from Bari and Gianluca from Agrigento came over. I only knew Antonio since we were mates during my 4 and a half month Erasmus experience in Liverpool. I waited for more than an hour to pick them up. They finally came out of the Sea Passenger Terminal at around 18:15. After the initial introductions, Antonio and I started off updating each other on the ongoings of the last two years. Gianluca knew everything about me and also saw the numerous video clips which Antonio had taken during our stay.

We lodged at my dad's farmhouse for the week. Baaniisu was with us all the time. Sometimes we cooked, other times my mum gave us a hand. Antonio and Gianluca met also our friends. Thursday, we went out to Paceville, Malta's entertainment mecca and both were amazed. In fact, both decided to spend the weekend there and they stayed for two nights at the 'La Vallette Resort'.

Apart from Paceville, Baaniisu and I took them around Malta, visited some cultural sites such as Fort St. Angelo, Vittoriosa (Birgu), Hagar Qim and Mnajdra Temples. We also took them to Valletta (the Capital City, Mdina (the Silent City) and to the Ta' Qali crafts village. A visit to Gozo was a must and there we visited the Azure Window, Cittadella, Xlendi, Calypso Cave and Ramla il-Hamra. Swimming was obviously a must; we swam in Gozo at the Blue Hole and Ramla il-Hamra and also in Malta, particularly at Wied iz-Zurrieq and St. Peter's Pool.

Baaniisu and I tried to show our two Italian friends as much as we could. We also showed them Dingli cliffs (the highest point) and the magnificent Blue Grotto.

As usual, I have not downloaded any photos yet to my pc. I will put some of them online for you the see in the coming days

France vs Malta

I was supposed to go to Rousset, France between the 27th and 2nd of September. It would have been a new experience since I was going with the football club Kirkop United with which I play. However, due to my ankle injury I decided not to make it. I am recovering but will surely not be able to play. My physio ordered me another week of exercise, but no running.

To be honest I am not too sad or worried about it. The reason is that Antonio, an Italian guy I met while in Liverpool in 2004 is coming over. We were both students at Hope University for the 2nd semester and had our rooms next to each other. We hung out together very often, initially since I was the only person around who could speak Italian; I was his translator. But then his English improved so I was asked to help only in technical situations.

I might sound crazy saying that I prefer a holiday here in Malta than one in France. Well I am, but I also need to return a favour. I stayed at Antonio's house for 10 days during Easter 2004 and he took really care of me. I also got really sick one day and his mum was kind enough to talk to the doctor and get medicine for me.

Had I not gone to France Antonio would have had to go around alone or with my dad. Well not actually alone since a friend of his from Sicily, Gianluca, is also coming over. It would have been unfair not to accompany him. My problem was taking leave off work, since two weeks would have been impossible.

Rest assured that this is an extremely rare occasion, that I am dumping a trip away from this friggin island. To my memory it is the second, but the reasons for the first were preposterous.

Antonio is arriving tomorrow at 17:00. I'll be there.

Sister Birthday surprise

That small miracle seems to have made me mute too, since my long silence since my last blog. Actually I did not have much time, and blogging from work is not quite an option, though a possibility.

Yesterday was my sister's birthday. She is 20 now, i.e. she lost her teens. A friend of hers from University decided set up a surprise for her, and so she contacted all of my sister's friends, including myself, to meet her at a bar. This we managed to do, though more people should have come, save for some excuse or other. Then my sister arrived, and she could not stop laughing....yes laughing...that is her way to treat surprise. After all the hugs and kisses and the "hi how are you!" and "long time no see" phrases, a cake was presented to her - and what a cake!! This huge chocolate cake was actually really good, had some taste of orange in it.

I could not stay late, since I had to wake up early as my girlfriend had exams today and I had to taxi her to the examination location. But my lovely dovely sister decided that I should carry this huge cake, and some presents back to my car, so that she can get wasted without having antyhing to think about. Well, ok I thought, except that I had to pass through the nightlife mecca with this huge, uncovered box holding a birthday cake. In fact, I became quite an attraction. Some people looked at the cake, trying to read out what was written; other asked for peace while some tried to put their finger in; some young English lads came singing to me: "Happy Bifthday to you, Happy birfday to you!!" Yep typical English people with a pint too many in their head.

Finally, we arrived to my parked car and drove off slowly home, making sure that the cake does not move too much or else....