Mdina

                   Beautiful Mdina Got

                  Even More Gorgeous

 

 

Did you ever see or pet a baby falcon?  I did yesterday when my neighbor Carmen and I went to Mdina for its annual flower and pageantry festival.

For me to tell you how beautiful Mdina is over and over makes no sense.  You’ll have to see it for yourself.  But let me tell you—in my organized prose--the highlights that I loved.

1. I had never seen falcons before. Yes, these are the famed Maltese falcons.  Big incredible birds like hawks or eagles, I would say.  Even the baby—which was only 14 days old—was big, but he could only flap around in a box.

2.  There were people all dressed up in authentic Medieval costumes—complete with swords and horrible boil-like things on their faces.  There were supposed to be re-enactments of battles, but we missed them.

 

                                                     

                                            Photo by Heike Lauer-Zapp

3. The walls, churches, gateways—everything—were covered with flowers of all kinds.

4. There was a Medieval kitchen in one of the old monasteries.  Stone walls and ovens, copper pots all over the place and pottery I wanted to steal.

5. Carmen’s brother-in-law—the former President and Prime Minster of Malta—had his portrait/photo hanging up in an art gallery.

6. No one stopped you from touching things—even the baby falcon or many of the pots and antiquities.

7. Carmen showed me the convent in Mdina where her aunt was a nun for 55 years.  “She went in that door and never came out,” she said.  That wasn’t one of the more cheerier thoughts of the day.  Nevertheless, it was an intriguing place.

8. We sneaked into one church where we watched florists set up---peonas--white flowers (resembling roses) shipped in from the Netherlands to be used in a wedding that evening.

Alas, there were “slaves” dressed in rags and chained together in the square, commemorating the slave market from centuries ago.  I was interested in one hunk, but they wouldn’t take a debit card.

 

 

 

Comments

[Sennuwy (an ancient Egyptian name)]

Hi Mary--Yes, teacher dear, Mdina is spelled correctly because it's spelled in Maltese. It means "city" in Arabic (Malta was once conquered by the Arabs). I'm too lazy right now to look up the size and population (sorry), but it's small--about the size of one of those villages. And, yes, people do live there- regular people but extremely wealthy. You hardly ever see anything for sale there because this property stays in the families who reside there. Come here-and I'll take you there.

[Mary Bartolotta]

Ilene,
Keep enjoying. Mdina sounds totally intriging (sp doesn't look right to me-teacher?). How big is it? Are there people living there now or is it all basically a museum a la Sturbridge Village or Colonial Williamsburg? Be well.
Mary

[Sennuwy (an ancient Egyptian name)]

Hi Dee--yes, please work on that! It would be great to be in Mdina together. I always love your comments---Ilene

[Dee Owen]

Sounds lovely! Mdina sounds similar to Warwick Castle in England. We saw the Falcons there around this time last year. Would love to see it in Malta...still working on that!