What's in a Name?

For those of you who haven’t yet sent us a care package (which should include a six-pack of Dr. Pepper, bottled Starbucks Frapuccino’s, and bag of Flamin’ Hot Cheetos) you may not be familiar with the proper way to address your postage. One of the cool and interesting things about walking the streets of Malta is that the houses don’t usually have street numbers… they have names!

A lot of the houses have names that are creative and sweet. Our pastor, for example, named his beautiful house Christine, after his beautiful wife. Another house we saw on our way to the beach was given the pleasant name Sea Breeze. And then the majority of houses are named after favorite saints like St. Catherine, St. Anthony, etc. But then there’s those crazy folk who try to get a little too creative, if you know what I mean. So Jessica and I kept track of our 5 favorite house names. Here they are:

5. Miami Flats – Hmm. Our flight was pretty long. It took us half-way around the world. I could’ve sworn we weren’t in Miami anymore. Maybe that’s where Don Johnson disappeared to…

4. Antmar &…

3. Josmel – These are just two examples of a sad, recurring pattern in house names. The idea is to combine the names of the couple living within. So if Jessica and I were to buy a house, we would call it Benjes. I know… blech! These houses are named after Anthony and Maria, and Joseph and Melissa, who apparently just don’t get it.

2. Blaze of Glory – I laughed out loud too. Don’t these people realize that they’re going down?

1. Daddy – I don’t think we need to explain. That’s just weird.

We have invented several games to play as we drive around, inspired by these house names. For instance, we come up with names that are subtly anti-British, like Lexington and Concord, or Plymouth Rock. We’ve also laughed at what our friends and families would have to name their houses, like Gerjan, Davnic, Rusreb, and Skiptreas. Our most favorite game is obscure house names. Our top two choices were Count Dooku and Lafawnduh. Waddya think? In fact, we’re doing our first reader poll: if you could name your house something funny or creative, what would it be? Just leave a comment below.

European Idol

Inquiring minds want to know: what exactly is music like for Ben and Jessica in Malta?

It's safe to assume that we hear Hollaback Girl about 12 times a day, but we were introduced to something new that I'm sure you folks back home have heard little about. Our first week here, as we wondered in angst about whether it was Bo, Carrie, or Vonzell that would become the next American Idol, we found something else to make us sit for long, unrecoverable hours in front of the TV: Eurovision.

Apparently, all of Europe has been getting together and voting for their favorite singers too, only they've been doing it for the last 50 years! A few twists though: each country sends their winner to the final round, which takes place all in one night, and the voting has more to do with politics than who is actually the best.

You can check out 30 second sound bites of each of the contestants here (just click on the multimedia lounge and go to audio). Our top 5 favorites were Denmark, Israel, Switzerland, Norway, and of course, the winner, Greece. So check it out if you're curious and have a moment. We're warning you though, don't expect any of the others to really be any good at all.

ir-Raba’ ta’ Lulju (the 4th of July)

You know that riddle that asks if there’s a 4th of July in England? Of course, the answer is yes, but they don’t celebrate it. Well, there’s a 4th of July in Malta too, but they didn’t seem to make that big a deal either (it is, after all, a former British colony).

But have no fear! Jessica and I did our best to pump up the festive spirit and celebrate. Here’s how our day went:

First, we set out nice and early to go to the beach. We went with Christine Agius, the pastor’s wife, and the Agius boys, Michael, David, and Mark. We met up with another family from the church at a beach called Ġnejna (juh-nay-nuh). It’s a great beach with rust-colored sand and a view of Gozo. We hopped right in the water, and the locals gave both Jessica and I high-fives. Although Jessica kinda caught it on the back of her hand, and I got it on the side of mine. It stung for quite some time. We were touched by their sentiments, or maybe it was just their tentacles. After all, the locals I’m talking about were jellyfish. Clear-ish, purply brown, about as big around as a tea cup, with 3 to 4 inch tentacles. I’m actually kind of glad that we both got stung. I wouldn’t have wanted Jessica to get all the high-fives alone. It wasn’t too bad, felt almost exactly like a bee sting.

The sun really started beating down at noon while I was playing soccer with the boys, so we decided to pack it up. And back in town, Jessica and I decided to lay low in our apartment during the heat of the day. There were great firecrackers going on outside. Mostly big BOOMs from cherry bombs and a few loud CRACKLE-POPS from those kinds that are all strung together. At least it’s not as if the firecrackers were going on directly behind our backyard or anything. And we weren’t at all extremely annoyed that it kept us from our nap. And I’m sure they were in honor of America and had nothing whatsoever to do with the festivals celebrating the local patron saint. It was a pleasant afternoon.

Then in the evening, we decided to head out to the Hard Rock Café for dinner. It was crowded in Paceville, where all the cool nightclubs are, but not more so than usual. It was just crowded enough to make parking a slightly stressful ordeal. When we got to the restaurant, the host politely informed us that the kitchen had closed early. Of course! Trying to be helpful he continued, “We close it early every Monday. In case you’re here on holiday.” NOW we know, but what good would that do if we were on holiday? Was he trying to tell us, “Next year, plan your vacation in Malta for Tuesday through Sunday”? Instead, we went across the way to a restaurant called OutWest, which is an Argentine steak house with an Aussie flavor (for those of you who are planning to open a steak restaurant and can’t decide the ethnic theme, you should be taking notes). It said Argentine Steakhouse on the door, beside which there stood a 6 foot cardboard cowboy, and there was kangaroo steak on the menu too. The food was really good, but we went back to the Hard Rock Café for lunch today ‘cause all I really wanted was the buffalo wings and a margarita.

We topped off the night with some Ben & Jerry’s sitting along the water’s edge, and finally got some recognition as a tipsy celebrant did a nails-on-chalkboard rendition of “Happy Birthday” to America in a nearby karaoke bar. At least someone besides the two of us was in the mood! So, we join that guy in saying…

Happy 229th, America!! Don’t worry; you don’t look a day over 180.

Best Before End

So our friend Jean mentioned the other day that his silencer was being repaired. We sympathized, because you don’t want something like that making a big racket late at night while people are trying to sleep. Needless to say, we would definitely ask Jean where he took his silencer if we needed to get ours fixed. There are shops all over that advertise that they could do the job, but we’d definitely want to use someone we could trust. We might even ask Pastor Joe where he would go if his silencer needed repair.

Ok, I know what you’re thinking. “Whoa, Pastor Joe has a silencer? I knew that they were just off the coast of Sicily, but geez!” Well, sorry to disappoint any who were anxious to hear about Ben and Jessica’s Mafioso Escapades, but in Malta, what they call a “silencer” you in the States might know better as a “muffler.”

This is just one of the many funny situations that has led us to a profound insight: We aren’t just learning Maltese, we’re learning English.

The first clue to this revelation happened 4 years ago when I was first studying in Malta. I found out by accident that there was no school the next day because of some undoubtedly important national holiday (it may have been the feast of Saint Paul or something). Without skipping a beat she asked if I would be having a lion the next day.

“A what?”
“A Lion.”
“Uh….”

Obviously there was some aspect of Maltese culture that had escaped me. Was she talking about the popular candy bar, Nestle Lion, that was perhaps ritualistically consumed on feasts of particular saints? Or maybe there was a custom involving displaying lions to show your support of the local saint. I was SO confused.

After further clarification I realized that she had said “lie-in,” not “lion.” Of course, I immediately made the connection between “having a lie-in” and “sleeping in,” as is the American English way of saying things. But I have to admit that I was afraid for a moment that I would have to ask someone where I could buy a lion if all of the shops were going to be closed for the holiday…

Clue number two: the milk. What is the most important piece of information on the milk carton in your fridge? Yes, yes, homogenization and pasteurization are important, I agree. But those of you who said “the expiration date” can take the day off work. Go ahead, tell your boss I said it’s alright.

Good ol’ “best before --/--/--.” You might even dig further back in the fridge at Safeway to find those newer milks, you know, the ones that are fresh off the delivery truck and don’t expire until next month. But imagine our confusion one morning as we were eating our Frosties, when we gazed innocently at the top of the milk carton and discovered the words “best before end.” Our mouths hung open in disbelief and our Frosties slowly grew soggy. When was the end? The end as in, the end of the week? The end of the month? The end of the world? Would the milk truly last until Armageddon? How on earth would we be able to find out when this “end” was, and would we be able consume the milk before then? Our minds searched desperately for the answer.

Now let me explain something here. There was a date under “best before end.” We knew that this was all just a weird way of saying “best when consumed before --/--/--.” But we had to laugh at how it was ever so slightly “off the mark” from what we would have said using our own English. That’s because we’re not talking about funny translations of Japanese or Lithuanian into English, we’re talking about an entirely different English: British English. And it’s different enough in some spots to make you say, “huh?”

We’re not the only ones scratching our heads. Jean had no idea what we were talking about when we said that the faucets weren’t working. His English wife Sally, who fortunately has read her share of Jackie Collins novels, had to explain to him that by faucets we meant the taps. And Sally certainly won’t ever let us forget the time we asked if we could stop by since we were “in the neighborhood,” because apparently that is another phrase peculiar to American English.

If you know us, you know how much we love to learn languages. So you’ll also understand that this has all been a bit of unexpected fun for us. Look forward to more of our adventures in learning English; we hope to have more examples in the future for your amusement.

End.