Category Archives: Thoughts

Thoughts

The nameless

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She didn’t really want too much in life, just the normal tings a 10-year-old girl wants – play in the street, have friends, eat, go to school, enjoy life with her family. The only problem with hr grand plan is that she is Syrian.

Her name is not important, at least it doesn’t seem important for many governments in Europe and many more people who live a comfortable life in the old continent. She is not a person, she is a number. She has no name.

I came across her story in a documentary on TV. Her dad was arrested and imprisoned – never to be seen again. She lived with her younger brother and sister in Aleppo, one of the cities most punished in the Syrian civil war.

Her mother kept on going until she finally had no choice but to leave – the constant bombing, insecurity, lack of basic necessities, and fear of repercussion took their toll. They sold everything and eventually managed to make it – legally – to Germany, where they were offered help in the form of an allowance and house.

What struck me about the whole story was that the family were just like any family I know. The mother spoke about rituals she had with her husband – they drank coffee every morning without fail. She smoked, too. The kids liked games, the eldest daughter loved dressing up and putting on make-up (yes, they’re Muslim – it has nothing to do with it). The boy liked football and the youngest enjoyed going to the playground and playing on the swings. They are a normal family.

And then I realized how misinformed the EU agreement with Turkey is, how closing boarders is downright cruel and people’s intolerance towards accepting migrants looking for a better life is selfish, racist, xenophobic, and close-minded.

And yes, comparisons to Nazism are warranted because even though there is no maniacal dictator, the manner in which Syrians, Afghans and others are being treated is similar to the Jews in the 1930s and 1940s.

Like those time, we speak in numbers. Names seem not to be important.

Thoughts

Barbaric tradition that needs stopping

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I’m against hunting in principle, so I couldn’t understand why foreigners painted all Maltese people with the same brush when it comes to bird hunting. We don’t all hunt. But then I understood. After watching the popular TV programme Le Iene, I felt anger and disgust for all the people on the Faroe Islands for very similar reasons.

I’m not sure if they are all in favour, but that’s pretty much irrelevant. The islanders practice a sick, barbaric tradition called Grindadráp, which sees hundred, no thousands of whales killed senselessly every summer.

I say senselessly because they do not eat the whale meat, or have any use for any part of the dead whales they are apparently thrown back to sea. It is purely a tradition which these people see fit to continue practising (wonder where I heard that before).

I can’t see why the people on the Faroe Islands (or Maltese hunters for the matter) can’t follow the example of their Danish cousins and take on the traditional Nøgenløbet Roskilde (Roskilde Naked Run) or their Finnish neighbour’s Wife Carrying Competition. Why is it that some people have to kill something to feel good?

This is something that should be stopped – as should hunting in Malta, bullfighting in Spain, dog-fighting and cock-fighting, and any other barbaric practice that results in the useless death of an animal.

Sign the petition to End the Faroe Islands’ Whale Slaughter

Thoughts

Why I put the French flag on my profile picture

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In the immediate aftermath of the terrorist attacks in Paris, thousands of people superimposed the French flag on their Facebook profile picture. I did, too.

Then, soon after, posts started appearing with reasons why people should not put up the French – or any – flag on their profile when such events happen. The main reason was that we should put up the flags of any nation where terrorist acts take place and that would mean changing very, very often.

This reasoning is intrinsically flawed because showing support for one people does not automatically mean that you do not support another. I put the French flag up on my profile picture not only in solidarity with the French people, but importantly with their way of living because it is also my way of living. The terrorist attacks were aimed at disrupting this very essence of the way Europeans live their lives. That is why I, as a European, wanted to show my support.

In this same month there were numerous other attacks – in Iraq, Lebanon, Mali, Palestine, Israel, Egypt, Somalia, Chad, Cameroon, Nigeria, and Bosnia. The list for the whole year is impressive. They are all tragic, and include uncountable dead. I feel for every single child, parent, brother and mother killed. And most others do, too.

But when you get hit on home ground, everything takes on a different perspective.

Thoughts

Man, that was hard

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I must admit – it’s been one hell of a slog and I am terribly glad it’s over. It all started around January 2013 when I had a bright idea, probably after that night out I had when I fell over and banged my head really bad. I remember waking up the next morning and saying candidly: “I want to do a master’s degree.”

It was a statement of intent and I was determined to do it, come hell or high water. And boy, did they both come to accompany me on my journey.

Let me take a step back for a moment. I left school at 17 with very few qualifications to my name – essentially, a handful of O and A levels, nowhere near to what I needed to get into university. This was the result of a political system that penalized you for attending a church school, which I did, and a fair doze of laze (yes, pun intended). In between naps, I felt cheated of the chance to graduate. This was 1986.

Fast forward to 2013. Having completed my bachelor’s degree in 2010, I felt I was now ready to take on a master’s, confident in the fact that I would manage despite having a family with three kids, a very full time job, which included a lot of travelling, and being an amateur triathlete.

The first books arrived a week before my start date, around 15 July 2013, and I eagerly set about my studying in a purposely built man-cave-cum-study in the cellar. I can’t quite put my finger on it, but I immediately realized that I had possibly bitten off more than I could chew. With the first few chapters read, I didn’t understand a word – nothing. Nothing. It dawned on me that I had 24 months left of this. 24 months.

It did get a tad easier, I must say, but not by much. Every waking hour was spent studying or thinking about studying. At home, during my breaks at work, early mornings, late evenings, on holiday, on trains and planes, everywhere and all the time.

Then, in November/December 2013, two events shook my world. First, on 4 November, my father passed away. It was terrible for obvious reasons, but it was made worse by the fact that I had a lot of things I wanted to tell him and never got the chance. One of these things was that, like my brother, I was doing a master’s degree. My brother has two, actually, and my father always mentioned it to me and the pride in his eyes was evident. I wanted to make him proud, too.

Exactly a month and a day later, I was made redundant from a job I loved. It was like kicking a man when he was down. It hurt and made me feel helpless, even because some people at my now ex workplace acted in an unbecoming manner. I was down, but not out.

I’m not quite sure what made me continue, but days became weeks, then months. And now, 24 months after starting, I have finally made it. I’m not sure what grade I’ll get – what I do know is that I gave it my all.

I guess that deep down, I wanted my dad to be proud of me, and my girls to look up to me as an example to follow. I also wanted to prove to my most vociferous critic that I could do it. And I did.

Thoughts

Repeal EU Directive 2001/51/EC

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The number of people – yes, they are people – getting into rickety boats and making their way to Europe is staggering. And only God knows how many people were killed on their way here, either because their boats couldn’t take the burden, bad weather or being forced overboard by the human traffickers. And for this luxury, immigrants pay in excess of €1,000.

In this video, Professor Hans Rosling explains that the reason why people don’t jump on a plane in air-conditioned comfort, paying one third of the price and landing safely after a five or six hour trip (rather than five or six days or weeks) is because of EU Directive 2001/51/EC.

In a nutshell, this directive, an extension of Schengen, lays out the fines carriers have to pay if they transport someone to an EU member state. And that amounts to around €3,000 per person carried.

What this directive does, in effect, is force people in war-torn zones to take an extremely dangerous trip across deserts, get ripped off by traffickers, sometimes held hostage and then dumped on an unseaworthy vessel to carry out the last leg of their journey towards Italy, sometimes Malta. If they are lucky enough to get there alive, they spend many weeks and months in limbo in hosting centres, a nice name for an unwelcoming facility.

Unscrupulous people have seen the gap in the market and are now making millions, and at the same time, the EU is spending millions to save these people and then give them shelter. It doesn’t make sense.

So why don’t we just get rid of EU Directive 2001/51/EC and allow airlines and other carriers to transport people without visas or the required documents to EU member states? On arrival, they would make themselves known to the authorities (they have to as these flights would ensure blanket checks on all passengers) and can then be taken to whatever facility the different countries offer. It probably won’t be paradise, but it’s definitely better than a watery grave.

There can even be quotas imposed on airlines, so the number of people will be divided equally across all countries in the EU. All this would result in:

 

  • Far fewer deaths in the Med
  • Cutting off the supply of victims to human traffickers
  • Spreading the refugees all across the EU, not limit them to Italy, Greece and Malta (ironically, this is now being done, but by the EU)
  • Leaving the refugees with money in their pockets and clothes in their bags – that means they can retain their dignity and you won’t have to pay for their clothes and food yourselves

 

All the money saved by the EU can then be used towards helping these people in whatever way necessary without adding further tax burdens on EU citizens. You may argue that this will result in many more migrants (people) coming. True, but rough estimates at the moment already talk about floods, so no big difference there.

I appreciate that it’s not so simple, but if leaders really want to stop the deaths, they should seriously consider repealing the directive. I doubt this will ever happen, but it’s worth a try.

Thoughts

Oh Master(‘s), my Master(‘s)

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I am now in what could possibly be described as the most difficult part of my Master’s degree – wading through a sea of words, quotes, theories, interviews and survey with the final aim of making a coherent paper on my chosen subject.

In a way, it’s like trying to piece together a shredded document – I know it is all there and that some careful thinking will help me put it together.

I am not sure what other students go through at this point, but am prone to believe that they struggle as much, feel tired and down, desperate and powerless, and then feel elated and determined to continue, proud and invincible – all at pretty much the same time.

As it stands today, I am putting together one of the two big sections of my dissertation – once these are done, I will be able to sit back and take a short breather before attacking the rest. It’s not that simple – I have to crunch around 15,000 words into around 8,000…

In two months from now, it’ll all be over and I will look back on this with, well, s sense of achievement, irrespective of the final result. Don’t get me wrong, I am aiming for the top grade, but it has all been a long, long journey. Along the way, I lost my father, my brother was diagnosed with a brain tumour (which he is fighting damn hard) and I was made redundant and had to go through the process of finding a job. And because I was successful in the latter, I had to learn the ropes at my new job. Don’t get me wrong – I am not looking for excuses. God only knows that people like my brother are faced with far more difficult circumstances, and he is dealing with it. Hope I have the same will power and interior strength to get me through these next 62 days.

(Written in dissertation mode, typos included)

Thoughts

What would you have done?

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In the midst of the Bosnian war, a reporter came face to face with a reality he wished he had never encountered.

The reporter was going around his business and this led him to a sniper position. The sniper was looking out and the reporter asked what he was seeing, when the sniper replied: “I see two people walking in the street. Which of them do you want me to shoot?”

It was at this point that I stopped reading, and I asked what I would have done if I were in the reporter’s position. During my years as a reporter, I got to visit Sarajevo and worked on an assignment which saw me interviewing a number of people – including combatants. As I was interviewing people, explosions in the background brought home the realities of war. When I was there, they were clearing mines, but when this journalist was there, the war was raging.

So what would I have told the sniper? Like the reporter, I would have tried to dissuade him from shooting either of the two people. The reporter tried to make the sniper desist, and then “made his excuses and turned to leave”.

I felt somewhat relived that I had the same idea as the reporter did, and felt confident that that was the best solution and the sniper would listen to reason and leave the two people go. But then I continued reading, and was in for a shock…

When the reporter was heading out, he heard two shots being fired and turned back to see what had happened, feeling as though an unwritten agreement had been breached.

“’That was a pity,’ said the sniper, ‘you could have saved one of their lives.’”

It took me a few minutes to realise the immensity of what the sniper had said – two people lay dead in the street.

What would you have done if you were the reporter? Would you have ‘sacrificed’ one of the two? The moral of the story is that sometimes we need to take hard decisions that have consequences. Not taking these decisions could lead to even worse results.

 

All reference from Carruthers, S. (2000) Media, Globalisation and ‘Other People’s Wars’ pp197-243. London MacMillian Press Ltd quoted in The Journalism Reader, University of Leicester

Thoughts

Fuelling discontent

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I can’t understand why the government in Malta doesn’t allow petrol station owners to sell fuel at whatever price they want. It’s a simple free market policy. Stations purchase fuel at a price and sell it with the aim of making a profit.

All across Europe, the price of petrol and diesel have been plummeting – but not on the Rock where a measly price reduction was announced recently and motorists are not enjoying the benefits of lower oil prices. Needless to say, prices increase without delay when oil prices go through the roof.

It’s a simple formula, really: Petrol stations in prominent areas and other which have invested heavily in their business can and should charge higher prices because they have higher overheads, while others in villages or off the beaten track could charge less and thereby attract more clients. This is what competition is all about – if you think Station A charges too much, go to Station B down the road. When A sees all his (her?) clients going to B, he will drop his prices, too.

It is ridiculous that the government does not realise this, and their press conferences organized to announce petty price decreases is risible.

The Opposition should not revel in the government’s troubles – they are equally responsible. Successive Nationalist (PN) governments over a 25-year period did nothing to change the situation. And the PN is supposedly a centre-right party which believes in the free market and all that.

In the meantime, Maltese motorists continue paying through their teeth to get from A to B, and a considerable part of this ‘investment’ is wasted waiting in the never-ending traffic jams. No wonder people are getting annoyed, for want of a better adjective.

Thoughts

The value of PR

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It may come as a surprise – or maybe not – that in times of business downturn, public relations are needed more than ever. It is a time when business not only have to sell under unfavourable conditions, but they also need to sell themselves as a company and brand.

This is why PR should never be undervalued or considered the small, annoying sibling of marketing. The two need to be employed strategically to achieve best results.

Currently, I’m looking for a new job and this means going through job vacancy after job vacancy on a myriad of portals. I have noticed that apart from the very large corporations, and sometimes not even those, few seem to give PR the importance it deserves. It always is something else with PR communications as a sideline show.

PR is relegated to a functional level and left out of strategic management, thus not being involved in creating objectives but solely committed to communicating objectives. The result is PR campaigns that are old, unoriginal and stagnated, plans that do not take into consideration new developments in the market.

Thoughts

Down, but not out

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Life tends to provide solutions hidden in plain sight, apparently. And when you realise, it hits you slap in the face. It came to me as I was watching the IPC European Championships this evening.

The athletes taking part are incredible – to put it mildly. They take their disability, if such you can call it, in their stride and go on to perform in track and field events that would put ‘normally abled people to shame.

My daughters were watching with me, and I explained what was happening and that, like the athletes, they should never give up whatever they do.

Then it dawned on me that the same should apply to me. After another ‘thanks but no thanks’ from a potential employer, I was beginning to feel the strain of repeated rejection. Admittedly, some things mitigate against me, but that’s no excuse.

Thinking of my own words to my daughters, and watching the incredible display by the para-athletes, I realised two things: the first is that perseverance is the key to success, and second, you can only depend on yourself. It’s time to get up and fight.