Another good Maltese Catholic in 1960s London
There have been so many stories of Maltese men who went off to live in Britain, North America or Australia in the days before easy travel and communication, sometimes leaving a wife behind, and who then got themselves a temporary wife to keep them warm during their ‘lonely’ sojourn, only to dump her and any children they had before coming back home to Malta to play the good boy tal-mami. The Wife Abroad and her children were jettisoned like so much detritus. Malta was the land of the disappearing men, emigrating alone, living the kind of life they would never have dreamed of living in Malta minhabba l-mami u l-kappillan, and then behaving like animals and feeling no sense of responsibility to the Inglizi.
I have mixed feelings about whether newspapers should publish letters like this one below, which invade the privacy of individuals who may not wish to be found or to have everyone gossiping about them. So far, the surnames in these ‘I’m hunting for my father/grandfather’ letters have been the equivalent of Smith and Jones, but they could easily have been less anonymous, and that isn’t fair to the individual concerned.
But when somebody behaves as this man did, dumping three small boys and disappearing, well then that’s different. I hope this person, whoever he is, has the decency to crawl out of his hole and do his best to seek forgiveness before he rots in hell, unless he’s there already. What a terrible thing to do. He’s lucky one of them wants to find him and get to know him.
The Times, Wednesday, 19th November 2008
Adopted child in search of family
Michael Zammit, LondonI am writing to The Times for help in finding my father and family in Malta. John Zammit is my father and was with my mother Dorothy in the early 1960s in the East End of London. I am the youngest of three boys from their relationship: Paul John, born in 1960, Anthony in 1961 and myself, Michael John, in 1963. John Zammit had a café in the East End of London with Dorothy and on occasion my grandmother Elizabeth would come to stay from Scotland. We were split as a family around 1964 and my father’s partner at the time, my mother Dorothy, died in 1992 in London. We have not seen either of our parents since we were around two years old and placed in the care of nuns, in a children’s home, and eventually adopted when we were between eight and 10 years old. I believe my father returned to Malta but I do not know when. Unfortunately, I do not have an age for him but from the recollection of my grandmother, with whom I was reunited for the first time a couple of weeks ago, he was born around the late 1930s, making him today about 72, God willing. My family in Scotland and the UK are Catholic, as was John Zammit. His surname I believe is fairly common but I hope someone will recognise something within these lines that will help to reunite us or at least fill in the missing lines of our lives. My address is: Michael Zammit, c/o Anthony Lyon, 111 Pine Road, Winton, Bournemouth. Dorset, UK. E-mail: redskymike@hotmail.com. Telephone 0044 1202 5159 12; mobile 0044 7703 22077.
22 Comments Comment
Leave a Comment
Daphne, you imply that this kind of behaviour is the sole preserve of Maltese Catholics. There are many adopted children (now adults), in the UK, who’s fathers are neither Maltese nor Catholic. Also, unless you know something I don’t, there is nothing in that story that says John had a wife in Malta. You also imply that John just upped sticks and left his wife and children to fend for themselves. While that maybe the case, it is also possible that his wife left him and took the kids. All we know is “We were split as a family around 1964”. How from that you can deduce that John Zammit will rot in hell, I’m not quite sure.
[Daphne – Don’t try and look for excuses. If your three infant sons end up in a home, it’s because you’ve abandoned them. He could have taken them back to Malta with him. Now let’s give a couple of wild guesses as to why he didn’t. Perhaps he didn’t want to go back home to the rahal with three illegitimate children and no wife? He showed more concern for social strictures than for the lives of his own children? Do you honestly believe that a woman with three infants in the early 1960s would have left their father, at a time when it was impossible for a woman to fend for herself, and with no proper social benefits? I can work out why she would have had to give them up – no money, no income, no man around to pay. And while this is not behaviour restricted to Maltese at the time – lots of British men did it too – in Maltese men it was particularly reprehensible and two-faced. They would go away, live lives unrestricted by any form of morality, then come back and resume their church-going, mama-loving persona. It was easy for them to do because they couldn’t be tracked down.]
Ok, I see your point. I just prefer to judge people after I know the full story. I guess I’m an optimist and look for the good in people. As a father myself, I would never leave my children, but then the mother, and grandmother also abandoned them, so what’s the story there? Right, assuming what he did is to abandon three kids, then I still fail to see why this is more reprehensible than a British man doing it?
[Daphne – It’s because some Maltese men, and I imagine women too, though they rarely emigrated alone, operated under the belief that what they did ‘abroad’ didn’t count. They became different people with different moral codes. The same thing happens here within our borders, on a restricted scale, with Gozo. People who live in Malta go to Gozo and morph into different beings on the ferry across, with all restraint left behind. This applies more to the young and silly than it does to older people, but you can see the same phenomenon in action. You can as easily have a dirty weekend on the main island as you can on the smaller one, but somehow it just doesn’t feel right, apparently.]
DCG
This kind of behaviour is not a maltese speciality:it is a human speciality!I remember the time when I used to work in Libya and the stories we used to hear of wife swopping in the camp needed to be confirmed so I asked the wife of a good friend of mine whether the stories were true and she answered yes,because the persons concerned will basically go back to normal behaviour when they go back to their countries and the present behaviour does not count.She should have added that because these expats were locked together in a camp for 11 months(they got 1 month off to go back to their countries or on holiday every year) needed some diversion to help them survive!So people do strange things when exposed to a sudden change of environment:some adjust well while others go completely haywire:it depends on how intelligent they are and how open to change.
I was lucky when I worked in Libya:I used to come home for 3 weeks every 5 weeks so it was easy for me to keep my sanity.
Do you think someone from rural Dorset going to live in the bright lights of London in the 60s would have been any different? My guess is that some of them would have become different people with different moral codes, while others would not. Pretty much like their Maltese counterparts. My point being that the Maltese are no different than anybody else (in general!).
As to the ‘Gozo Phenomena’, that 1 mile strip of water does make a big difference. I don’t know why either!
DGC,
Assumptions galore!
– Maltese man shacked up with British lady becuse he believed it was ok to sire children and leave them to their own devices, as long as this happened in the UK.
-“Family split up” means Maltese man did a runner.
– The fact that the man did not contact the children means he’s an uncaring so-and-so, deserving of eternal damnation.
Of course you could be right on each and every point. However, there are also a dozen other possible more charitable explanations of the sort which would easily not lend themselves to condemnation in strident moralistic tones.
[Daphne – Funny how this is a country where everyone bleats about the cruelty of those who abort a foetus, but then everyone rushes to defend those who dump real, living children and never bother to see them again, assuming that there might be a ‘charitable explanation’. What charitable explanation can there possibly be for abandoning your own children? Dumping them on the nuns because you can’t cope alone, but still continue to visit them, is one thing. Doing a runner is another.]
Mental illness?
[Daphne – A man in his 20s? Hardly. Stick to this guiding principle, and you will almost certainly get things right, whatever area of life you apply it to: the most obvious explanation is likely to be the real one. The bugger just did a runner, like so many before him and so many afterwards. And may I hasten to add that women have done the same thing, too – only more rarely, because it really goes against all instincts. However, thinking about it I know at least three women who abandoned their children completely, leaving the country and starting a new life without them.]
Who says mental illness doesn’t strike younger adults? Your point that the most obvious explanation is probably the reason is valid, yet and in this case doesn’t seem to be borne out by the the fact son is keen to trace his dad -unless it’s to let him have a piece of his mind. BOTH parents doing a runner?? The statistical chances of that one must be astronomically high.
[Daphne – No, this is how it used to happen in those very different social times: the father does a runner and the mother, unable to look after three small boys born a year apart – something of which I have direct experience, incidentally – while also working to support them financially, gives up and puts them in a home, and is then persuaded, because that was the mentality of the time, that it would be best for them if she never saw them again and allowed them to ‘settle’, following which they would be given up for adoption. There are scores of sad stories like this one. Why would the son look for his father? Because only the exceptional few have no curiosity about their roots; because the wound will not heal otherwise; because he wants to hear it direct from him – why did he do what he did?]
Your explanation is plausible. Of course the reverse might have occurred, with the lady falling prey to mental illness, or buggering off,(or both – it can happen) and the man finding it difficult to cope and placing the kids in care.
My point was that one can’t really jump to conclusions and judge individual cases – unless one is familiar with all the facts.
Daphne, your explanation, “the father does a runner and the mother, unable to look after three small boys born a year apart” may in all probability be correct. What I, and a few others here are trying to say is 1) You can’t assume it’s correct with the amount of data we have, and 2) Even if it is a correct assumption, why imply it is/was a solely Maltese problem? I’ll add a third point. Isn’t up to the children to judge their father, and not us? Maybe they can, rightly or wrongly, forgive him. Who are we to condemn?
[Daphne – What an attitude. If society won’t ‘condemn’ those who abandon infant children, then it will condemn nothing. One of the reasons why fewer children are ill-treated and abandoned today – aside from abortion and more accepting attitudes towards single mothers – is that enlightened attitudes mean this sort of behaviour is very much frowned upon. Condemnation serves a good purpose sometimes because it helps keep people’s worst traits in check. That’s why this man felt OK about abandoning his ‘secret’ children in the UK but probably wouldn’t have abandoned them at home in Malta, with all the neighbours saying x’gharukaza. I always say that consenting adults do what they like as long they don’t hurt others, and yes, who are we to condemn – but when children are involved, forget it. That’s something else altogether. Abandoning children is completely unforgivable and there can never be any excuse or justification. Civilised people in civilised societies do not abandon their children.]
Yes men around the world have abandoned wife and off spring. Maltese men have been known to go abroad and father children while married to a Maltese ( zaqqa mas sink) lady. It was easier then than it is now since in this era everything travels faster, including news. I feel that the above men have been hurt by what you said………….what I do not understand is why are you all so protective of this soul? Yes he abandoned a family and may he rot in hell!
[Daphne – Yes, I agree with you. People who try to excuse and forgive the abandonment of children have never seen the effect of this behaviour close up.]
Wrong, Fluke. All those men who wantonly abandon their families deserve condemnation, without reservations. But you simply cannot judge individual cases on the basis of incomplete information.
I’m in two minds about this. So if the children were to forgive this man (and it probably happens more than we think), should we still condemn him?
He’s done wrong, but if the family see fit to forgive him, should we continue to stir things up? I don’t know this guy, and I’m not trying to be an apologist. In normal circumstances you don’t abandon children, but I don’t know the circumstances, so how can I judge.
It’s a difficult one, and yes, you are right it has never happened to me or to anyone close to me, so perhaps I’m not the right one to comment.
One thing which I am 100% sure of though is that this is not a particular Maltese trait!
Raffaella Carra “e il tuo padre dal Argentina , sta sera e’ qui!!!! ” It is true that abandonment of children is deplorable , but I cannot link it with religion. Daphne tries to convince us that Religion is the root cause of marriage problems.This trait is spread around the world just look at some foreign men who work here alone while their wives and children are in far away India or Pakistan. Daphne , you don’t know what is really happening around you today , let alone in the 60’s.
[Daphne – Actually, I do. And religion definitely was the root cause of the problem – not the religion per se, but the way it was taught, as a substitute for true morality. And let’s not get started on the sexual repression. This holds true of some other religions besides Catholicism, and especially of those religions which, like Catholicism, teach/taught that non-Catholics were somehow inferior or ‘didn’t count’, which is precisely why so many Maltese men felt free to do things with and to their non-Catholic women that they would never have done with and to their Maltese women back home. It goes beyond mere religion, and takes in nationality too: Maltese Catholics are/were considered superior to any other sort of Catholics. This meant that, in an English Catholic woman, her Englishness took precedence over her Catholicism, and so she was disposable. I can’t imagine why you deny this, given that we still continue to see it today. Whole armies of Maltese men line up to masturbate at or expose themselves to ‘foreigners’ on our beaches, in the countryside, and even in gardens, and at playgrounds. I am in no doubt at all that the reason I attracted so many of these perverts when I lived in touristy Sliema was because my height, general appearance and the way I dressed led them to think I was yet another ‘frustiera’, ‘barranija’ or ‘studenta’, and the same when I used to go down to Ghajn Tuffieha beach with my little blond children and a BOOK, two clues that I wasn’t Maltese.]
you rock daphne
Daphne , you seem to forget that in the sixties there were men and women who did not give a hoot what the Kappilan preached.Just look at the results of the referendum on Integration.
About the peeping toms ,perverts , and flashers: they exist all around the world.
To tell you the truth , we used to go to Golden Bay in the same period , and there used to be some pervert nannu walking around while looking at the topless girls sunbathing near us . Not mothers reading books!
[Daphne – That’s probably because the mothers reading books were not 24 years old, 5′ 7″ and a size 6 in a minuscule bikini, as I was……..]
Another assumption reeking of class hatred.
[Daphne – Sorry, I don’t get your point. And you seem to overlook the fact that your assumptions reek of class hatred of a different sort.]
@John,
when on holydays in Malta, whenever I spend some time on the beach, I meet those “sharking around” perverts.
Yes, I am blonde,not that young anymore, obviously not maltese…AND I ALWAYS wear a bikini top, read a book…and sometimes I even bring my friends’ children with me.
That as a whole never stopped the perverts to carry on with their dirty “peeping business”.
I know that there are these guys who don’t have the ‘guts’ to face a girl , but shark around in vantage points with binoculars.
Some six months ago there used to be a flasher near the blue grotto promenade at around six in the morning showing his wares to women who were jogging . It seems that he was dealt with the way they do over here: without troubling the police. I haven’t heard any more reports about this pervert.
I think a topless girl draws more attention than a mother of three reading a book. BTW five seven is not considered tall, medium size I would say.
[Daphne – Then I must be more than 5’7″ because I am quite obviously tall and not medium-sized.]
You look tall when you wear stilettos, and because you are thin.My wife is five nine and we consider her medium, btw she doesn’t wear high heeled shoes she doesn’t need to.
[Daphne – I wear flat shoes. I don’t even own stilettos, and I can no longer be described as thin. Your wife is not ‘medium’ at 5’9″ but tall. Models start at that height. What’s your problem here, anyway?]
I have no problems, I was just testing how vane you are! LOL
[Daphne – You’re a strange man. The only vane around here is the one on our roof.]
Hello Daphne
I have just read your article “Another good maltese catholic in 1960s London”, It was very interesting to me, because I am one of those abandoned children.
All I know of my father is that his name was John Schembri, and that he was maltese. My mother was English, she would never talk about my father.I was very young when they parted “for what ever reason” and dont remember much about him, except a very tearful goodbye.
My mother has now passed away, and there is nobody to ask the burning questions, why, when, where,I do not feel angry or resentful towards my father.I am at an age when I understand that everything is not as black and white as we would like them to be, and that there may have been many reasons for my fathers departure.
However I would still like to trace him if possable, but I am not sure where to even begin, do you know if there is help for people like myself in Malta.
Georgina Allen
I am one of the three boys. The youngest. I have found my Maltese relatives as a result of the letter to the Times of Malta, to which I am extremely grateful. My father died before my search was successful. I agree and disagree with some of your points as you can imagine. But I see it from within. This may well prevent me from making a judgement that truly reflects the consequences of my parents’ actions. But I speak for myself in that I carry no bitterness nor regrets. Look forward and let go.
Michael