Malta

Hamdulillah!! (Thanks be to God!!) It’s a long weekend! Although I have a ridiculous number of official days off from work since we take holidays from both the Egyptian and American calendars, it’s been about six weeks since we’ve had a holiday, and this long weekend (for the 4th of July) is much needed with all the work that we’ve had lately.

To get away as much as possible from work and from the Egyptian summer heat, I’m spending the weekend in Malta, a small island off the coast of Sicily in the Mediterranean Sea. To be completely honest, I didn’t know much of anything about Malta when I bought the plane ticket (and to be even more honest, I still don’t know much!), but now that I’m here, I’m sure I’ll learn more very quickly. Here’s my first lesson…

While waiting for my flight at airport in Cairo, two men and a woman sat down nearby. I noticed by their dress and their look that they didn’t appear to be Egyptian, yet they were speaking Arabic to one another. I reminded myself that I should be studying more so that I can someday be one of those people who doesn’t look Egyptian but speaks Arabic well. After a few minutes, though, I caught them speaking French, or at least a phrase of French, and not long after that, their speech sounded Italian. I concluded that they must be Europeans with business in the Middle East, so while their native tongues may be French and Italian, their Arabic was quite good. But I still couldn’t figure out why they would be flying to Malta, so I was thoroughly confused. Little did I realize at that point in time that they were actually speaking Maltese!

Malta, from what I’ve gathered, has been influenced over the years by Phoenicians, Romans, Arabs, Normans, Crusaders, the French and the British. The language that has developed as a result of all these influences is a Semitic language that has borrowed a lot from the Romance languages. It’s most closely related to Arabic, but is still written using the Latin alphabet.