The Malta Independent on Sunday
Quarantine at sea for a maritime historian
LIAM GAUCI Name of the Prince Part I In the
has been the Curator of the Malta Maritime Museum for the past 14 years. He has published several studies about Maltese Maritime history and has been researching the connection with food and the sea for a number of years. His book was an attempt to uncover the stories behind licenced pillaging upon the seas in late 18th century Malta. In of his Covid Diary last week Liam related how, in March 2020, he had to cancel a working trip to Norway and hastily return to Malta from another one in London. Here he shares his experience in quarantine on a sailing yacht.
“Aquick call home before boarding and it was decided that I would undergo voluntary quarantine on a boat. As any exemplary Maritime Historian would do, I commandeered a 35-foot sailing yacht moored in harbour. My remaining minutes on British soil I used to write up and despatch a list of necessities for my lonely sojourn. It was my father who acted as quartermaster and stocked my car with all the provisions. The stock was full of historically accurate victuals as after all I had two weeks ‘out’ at sea so why not indulge in some experimental culinary archaeology while at it.
The stock was to my liking, my father came up trumps as always. And so started my two weeks of solitude, rocked by the sea to the tune of the creaking rigging. Quarantine would have a profound impact on my perspective of the rest of the year and of the contagion itself. I read most of the day, interspersed with gushes of writing and essential remote working. The complex recipes I wanted to painstakingly recreate also occupied many a happy hour. I made my own pasta and flatbread, salted my own meat, preserved fruit and pickled vegetables… all the victuals that coloured folios of seafaring manuscripts.
In my quarantined boat a new state of affairs developed. Remote working had me procrastinating one moment and delving into spectacular projects the next. Nothing more so than when it was decided to put together short documentaries about the history of food. It was the perfect opportunity. A drive for digitisation had been instituted by our CEO, Noel Zammit. A decision was taken to consolidate our relationship with
MTA and produce historic recipes in deserted spots on the island. Spots which precovid were full of tourists, now became deserted postcard settings. It was the perfect combination. During a zoom meeting colleagues vociferously claimed ‘Upheaval brings opportunity’, so a team of likeminded individuals was put together and off we went: location scouts, marketing professionals, chefs, historians, producers and script writers. Picture a deserted Blue Lagoon and the stories of Maltese corsairs seeking shelter and feasting on a prawn risotto. Or an empty Republic Street in Valletta where we showcased the unique history of coffee in our capital city. Thus a documentary series whose aim was to instill a culinary pride from our past was born.
It soon transpired that new opportunities were offering themselves. This was not a revolution but an evolution to the inevitable: online dissemination of our rich past.
But of course, at sea, even in harbour, much depends on the weather. March can be windy, and a force 5 gale was probably the roughest night I had had in years. But on calm days the boat rocked me gently to sleep, broken only by the piercing sun and a sharp need for brewed coffee which had become a daily ritual. French pressed of course not that instant brodetto that people claim to be
instant ‘coffee’. A decent coffee can never be ‘instant’.
Ritual and routine are essential at sea, and the blare of a recorded bugle on the boat’s sound system at sunset told me that the day was done, and I could pipe down to dinner and wet my whistle. Time went by in that interminable cycle of day and night that are so poignant when close to nature and away from the humdrum of cities.
Fourteen days and a few bottles of wine later, quarantine was over. I was untouched by the virus but heartened in every other way. It had been one lonely but inspiring journey. Friends from afar had remained in contact and one in particular deserves a mention. Dr Daniel Gullo a colleague and a friend had helped me get hold of scanned copies of a 19th century siege diary and in 14 days I had transcribed the whole thing. Never had I worked so peacefully on my research. The amount of reading I had put in was simply unmatched. And to my pleasant surprise, I had learnt that one can remain quite fit on a moored boat. A host of pull ups, squats and an array of exercises are a great way to burn out the ragouts, pasta and Spotted Dick of the night before.
When I stepped back on dry land, Malta was in lockdown. Although
I did not realise it yet all around me had changed. The streets were eerily calm and as I drove back home to the normality I had known, I realised that the new norm was not the ‘normal’ of February 2020. Will we ever return to the ‘old’ world of pre-covid Malta?. I very much doubt it. The sooner we accept it the better. History teaches us that the clock of time can never be reversed, and those who try live on simply by littering the pages as the failures of history. The changes in our society can already be felt and our way of life will surely keep changing. Will it be for the better? Only time will tell. And when that bell tolls, we must remember that hindsight is a cruel mistress.
So like those lone sailors of old I decided to trust in the process
of change. The sails for the future of our society have been set. Storms have hit our frigate and sadly we have lost some sailors along the way. Venus however shines bright in the evening light, like a beacon of hope. Like man’s fortunes, Venus appears and disappears and changes position. But deep down we know that it will shine. This much I learnt during my quarantine as I gazed upon the heavens. We must shift and change in order to shine bright again. I walked clumsily on dry land. No monuments to St Roque or St Sebastian, the patron saints of plague victims will be constructed. But I have built my own. To the memory of those 14 days of quarantine staring at the evening star: Venus.