“A car from the hotel picks us up, straight to the hotel and, on our second wind after very little sleep, we have a drink and take a walk down to the seafront. Wow! What interesting buildings, little roads and paths. And a super seafront with promenade, cafés and all sorts of interesting things. We look at each other and say, ‘I could deal with this!'” Talmaone describes how she came to focus on Malta as a possible new place to live…
“Where does the story start? Maybe the beginning should be the reason for wanting to leave one’s country of residence for another. So that’s as good a place to start as any.” Reasons for moving to Malta from the point of view of a British expat living somewhere in the Spanish-speaking tropics…
“We needed to be in Pozzallo to book our ferry tickets to Valletta by 09:00 Monday morning. We also had to find a vet in Pozzallo to get the dogs’ tick and worming treatments done and certify them to allow them into Malta. The treatments have to be given not less than 24 hours and not more than 48 hours before entry. So we had a bit of a timescale here as the ferry in Pozzallo only runs on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays.” Carol, Barry and the dogs approach journey’s end.
“It’s here! It’s here! It’s in Maltese waters, anyway! Our container ship has been sat sitting outside the harbour since Saturday, waiting for a berth. It’s got my kitchen and knickers on it.. and it’s there, right bloody there! And I can’t have it!” In Part Two of her journal, Stroppy Knickers’ possessions are tantalisingly close to catching up with her…
“We spent the rest of the evening discussing how best to drop the absent plumber in boiling oil, and cheerfully blew up the airbeds in preparation for a very long night trying to pee quietly in a bucket and periodically whispering obscenities in the general direction of anyone unfortunate enough to be a bloody plumber.” Part One of Stroppy Knickers’ journal of her move to Malta.
“Most decent expats are far too busy to spend hours daily propping up an expat watering hole. So if you “accidentally” come across bar-room wisdom from someone who seems to have all the answers, contacts, friends in high places etc. to make your transition to your new life really easy… find out from the bar staff how often they frequent the place and then ask yourself why they do not appear to do anything else.” More salutary advice from Ginnie Bedggood on how to prepare for that move to the DR.