Pizza Capricciosa – Rachel Borg

First we were told to go swimming. Now we have been told to go and get our tummies full, have a night on the town and end the evening with a sweet pillow to lay our heads on. What more could we want? Labour’s parties just keep on giving. From Petrus to Marsovin, from Dubai to Marsalforn. And if it’s going to be a Capricciosa that’s ok too, though some might stretch to a Fillet Mignon.

Maltese customers have always been good for business. Eating out and frequenting the hospitality industry was one of the main personal expenses for many youths and adults alike. Sundays were full to the door with customers at restaurants all over the island, from Marsaxlokk to Valletta, Sliema, St. Julians, Buġibba, Qawra and other localities.

Once the restaurants were forced to close under the health directives in the fight against the spread of the COVID-19, people took to their kitchens and suddenly actually began to make some of those many Pinterest dishes they had pinned. Masterchefs were made overnight and eating became a time for the family to get together at home and appreciate good food without the hefty bill at the end.

This experience will not be forgotten. Once discovered, it is now part of our culture as much as the culture of eating out had become. Certainly, we are not turning our back on a good Indian meal or a delicious plate of pasta, but when comparing a bare, distant restaurant, with cutlery in a bag and an unlaid table to our dining table at home bursting with delicious dishes of vegetables, ethnic food, or a good Maltese timpana or rabbit, able to smoke on the balcony after the meal and open that next bottle of wine without breaking the bank, well, it seems a little unlikely that we will revert soon to the habit of going out bit.

Perhaps as people return to work and there is a separation again between work and life, time will once again be short and the need for a ready-made meal will hit us again. Between frozen food and a bare restaurant, the latter will begin to seem attractive again.

Lo and behold, the 20.00 euro vouchers arrive in our letter box and we are told to ditch buying local potatoes to save the farmers and to now support the restaurants and bars and we are torn between the two, but we also want to remain loyal to our favourite Sunday eatery and fear that they should be forced to close down. So, the home-cooking can wait a bit and we see if we can still fit into last summer’s clothes and if the shoes are still trendy.

Following that, we ditch our HOC or two-bedroomed flat in Sliema and go to a farmhouse with pool for a weekend break, costing the quadruple of the voucher. Masks can be damned. Now it’s time to have fun and relax after all our time at home. To be fair, many friends have been apart for all these weeks and would be happy to reunite and compare recipes and stay-home melt-downs. Parents can once again enjoy some privacy and take their hotel overnight on their wedding anniversary which is coming up.

Which is all well and good. Why not? And our businesses really do need help to overcome the stagnation. I think it was just a matter of time before the itch came to go out anyway, 2 metres or not and a perspex here and there. Not that romantic but the urge to spend and to be outside now that summer is here is really irresistible.

A more long-term incentive though, would have been to reduce the 18% vat on restaurants and the 7% in hotels. Most restaurants abroad are found to be cheaper than those in Malta, even in Italy. And what about incentives to tourists? Attracting them here needs more than a video with pasitizzi in it and a girl in a white flowing dress (never happens IRL) on Dingli cliffs.

Wait a moment, though. The building industry never stopped and had their permits extended. What if there is an over-supply of apartments now? Should we be helping that industry too to offload their over-priced properties? Wouldn’t the tax come in useful now for the national accounts? What about the victims of the collapsed buildings who perished or remain without a roof over their heads to call their own?

Gozo Channel continues to keep money for tickets purchased for groups that never materialized. A refund of that money would be very useful to businesses who may not even make it to next year when perhaps, by late 2021, tourism will begin to improve. Or our famous St John’s co-Cathedral which, as far as I know is still closed to tour groups, but does not refund purchased tickets either. This issue needs to be addressed so that before drawing our money to sustain businesses, the businesses themselves are given a chance to save themselves and have a fair playing field.

Those couples who lost deposits on their weddings are due to receive a refund from the government. Why not agencies who had their groups cancelled and who actually paid the money to government entities or private venues?

For those people who continue to work from home, no help with rent or water and electricity? Many offices remain closed with no work. Schools are closed except for this Skolasajf where parents who have not gone back to work assume they may as well keep the children with them and be done with it. My latest chit on water and electricity read High. Of course.

It is good that the wage support is being extended till September because for many people the situation is still way behind and far from optimum. The contribution to the nursing homes and residential care homes is also a good gesture because without their sterling service the story with COVID-19 in Malta could have been very different.

Throughout this time, family members have passed away and their nearest and dearest were unable to nurture them at their most vulnerable time. Some have left us. Others remain caught in the void of their protection. It is right that the ban to visit will be lifted soon.

Our streets will once again get full of cars and dust (though the dust never stopped), cranes and cement mixers. Windows will have to remain shut and blinds drawn. Trees sit in cement with little twigs for branches and birds fall from the sky with pellets in them. The noise of DJs in the weekend afternoons blasts across the bay and the new ferry at Balluta comes in and out with more frequency than our credit card at the ATM.

Is this normal? Konrad’s back, medical certificate in hand, so it must be.