What I shall remember about Malta

Abstract

I like to think that my previous articles for the "MALTA YEAR BOOK" (in 1963, 1966 and 1973) impressed readers by the logical exposition of the facts in them. But it seems to me that however I write this year's article it will appear a hotch-potch. But memories are a hotch-potch; reader, you think back over the last decade of your life and the memories that spring to mind will be a disconnected garnering of happenings. Perhaps a better simile for such memories is a pot-pourri of dried aromatic flowers and herbs which usually stay undisturbed, gently perfuming the background of one's life with the experience gained from the past. Suddenly however the pot-pourri is stirred by some stray thought and a multitude of perfumes are released: sweet scents of happy times and the more bitter scents of opportunities missed. Even so the bitter perfumes soon fade because lost opportunities rapidly become experience for the future. [excerpt]