Alone, in Malta - Malta rules!

Finally, Malta. Arrived here before 9am. Took a bus to ... well, Malta. The bus route is probably set so that it goes through the entire island within 2 hours. I decided to let the driver drop me off somewhere in Sliema - actually called by bro to ask where to start the trip and to get him to make a search in google - Sliema or Valletta - the answer was, probably Sliema. And after conversations in the bus, also managed to find probably the best stop to hop off, near the place where all the ferries take off.

Talking about the best places, I mentioned in my first post that the pizza I had in Bergamo, Italy, was kind of shit. Well, en-route to Sliema I saw a place with a big sign - "The Best Pizza in the world" - now that's the place I need to check out at some point.

The driving
On the way to Sliema the bus had three potential accidents, from my humble point of view anyhow, drivers pushing out from their own lane. Sometimes in really seemed that the driving licenses here...are there any at all? Truth be told, I saw at least three driving school cars as well, so that's that. After I had noticed the driving, I also noticed something in the bus, the name and picture of Jesus's Mary (well, you know, The Mary). That kind of explains, they drive and they pray that everything will go well. And the fun thing, maybe because everyone has gotten used to it, everyone knows that the stronger driver here wins always, Darwin here, Darwin there, you know, and based on the statistics I found on the internet, Malta has the lowest death rate from traffic accidents, with just Maldives having a lower number. The statistics show that Malta has around 25 deaths per million population.

The critics say though that if we would measure driving deaths not per population but per kilometer travelled, the numbers wouldn't be so positive.

On the way from the airport to Sliema I also saw "traffic" signs that I haven't seen before, like "please notice the roundabout rules."

First encounter
The few people in the bus were extremely polite when I asked them stupid questions like...wtf should I do now? Well, in a nice way, of course, but I got the first really good experience in the first bar I went to, Tony's Bar. I went there, asked for a beer and then if I could charge my laptop battery. Well, I got my beer, and sandwich, but the gusy showed me that the thre charging spot they had in the bar were all full. Oh well...

I drank my beer, ate my sandwich. The waiter (might have been Tony, who knows, chances are 80/20) came to ask if I want a check or....and then I stopped him and said that I could but I would really need to charge my battery to find a hotel to stay, as really, after pretty much not sleeping for two nights, after nearly 30 hours in the same clothes, not to mention, for Maltese weather, too dark and too long clothes, I felt I was stinking bad. Yes, I said that to him as well. The mr. stinky part, not the long version. And then the guy said that sure, he'll find a place in the kitchen to charge the battery, just give me your laptop. Well, I gave it to him.

Two minutes later he was back and said Maltese electricity switches are different than mine. Shit. But you see, 20 meters in the right there's a shop with towels outside, leave your laptop here, and go to this shop and buy the thing that would make my charger work in Malta as well...well, I did. Forty-five second and EUR 3.95 later I was back and the charging could start.

Oh Tony, I love you man! After 30 minutes I had enough battery to find and book myself a hotel, the cheapest one through booking.com just happened to 300 meters from Tony's, at EUR22/night I decided to go for it and made a booking for three nights.

The people
It's difficult to put into words, but the people in general seem extremely nice here, three times as nice as in Milan, two times as nice as people in Portugal. They all seem so friendly, so ... nice. And I've been here for 24 hours now total. It could be the first impression, but so far, I have no bad things to say at all. And they always apologize, just to be nice.

The homeless people?
So far I haven't seen too many homeless people around in Sliema, or at least I haven't seen many people asking for money. One guy with problems with legs, the toes and a few centimeters more seemed to have been cut off somehow. And one guy passing by a bar asking money for children. I didn't ask for specifics in the sense of which children, but gave him some coins. The fun thing here is that he checked all tables in this bar, all six where people were at the moment of his passing, and each and every table gave him some money.

The wrong-sided people
I understand that for English people this might be weird to read, but as I already mentioned, the cars drive on the wrong side of the road here. And what I have noticed yesterday and today (today being the second day in Malta) is that people seem to be wrong-sided as well. You know, on the street, you walk and someone else walks towards you from the opposite side, and you both walk on the same "line" so that at least one of you needs to go right or left...well, they all tend to go the wrong way, meaning my way, meaning even while walking human-collisions are easy to get into. Yeah, I know, it's me, it's my problem. I'm just kidding you know, I love Malta, independent of all the weird things I have noticed for myself.

First hotel eccentricities
The hotel I booked for 3 nights was located nearby...well, everything here in Sliema and when I went there I also asked if there's shower gel or soap in the room, just to make sure. Or if it isn't, what's the closest place I could get some. The guy there, really friendly, said that of course there was. Well, three minutes later I was back in the hotel admins place where I couldn't find the admin but the cleaning lady from whom I asked for it. Well, she said that right now they don't have any, but she managed to find some kind of shower gel for me, someones leftover. That was nice. Of course, what wasn't nice was that, as I later realised while showering, it wasn't a clue, but it wasn't a shower gel either. But instead some kind of 7-day hair...conditioner? I don't know, but definitely not even a shampoo. At least now I know my entire body should be good for 7 days now. I think.

There also doesn't seem to be any shower curtain, and the shower door has been cut from the bottom a bit to allow it to open and close - the bath would get on the way otherwise. Not sure which was installed first, the bath or the door.

But all in one, independent of the hotel shower, the notsodeadly dangerous wrong-sided driving, Malta so far is not far from being perfect. For what exactly, that remains to be seen.