Comments on: They beat them to it

By: John Schembri

John Schembri — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 19:47:30 +0000

We have seen the underground passages of Valletta on Xarabank. I know of two blocked passage doors in cellars of big palazzos in the city.

By: Reuben Scicluna

Reuben Scicluna — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 10:40:34 +0000

QUOTE
Daphne – I agree with your last point, which is primarily why I kept silent.
UNQUOTE

I didn’t get the impression that you kept silent because you were all over the place saying that if they dug holes in Manhattan, London and Athens they can jolly well dig a hole in Valletta as well.

[Daphne – I kept very silent. You will notice that I didn’t write anything at all about this museum project until things came to a head. It is the process by which things came to a head which interests me, rather than the project itself. Any comments I make about the museum at this juncture are made merely to illustrate the dangers of having a pressure group hijack the democratic process. What next – public lynching of those who are ‘obviously’ guilty, to save time and money on trials by jury?]

By: Moggy

Moggy — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 09:45:32 +0000

Yes I have read an article, in another magazine, re Edward Said’s investigation of subterranean Valletta. It was very interesting. Believe me, I was not after dragging the man into the battle. All I was after was a professional opinion as to how this subterranean “world” is affected by deep excavation – but I understand his not being too eager to give it, as it is bound to be bandied about one way or another.

By: Moggy

Moggy — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 09:01:38 +0000

Does anyone know whether Edward Said was in agreement with the proposed plans for a museum under St. John’s Square?

[Daphne – I know Edward Said, and I know that he will have no wish to be dragged into a ‘for or against’ battle. Some people are embarrassed by this sort of involvement. I cited his opinion here only because he has studied Valletta’s underground situation. I would like him to write about it, in fact, for one of my magazines and we have been talking about this.]

By: Darren

Darren — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 08:45:15 +0000

What a beautiful description by Edward Said, he must have felt like Indiana Jones going through those tunnels. And a brave lad he is too. I know the Maltacom blokes who work the Valletta sector, as I used to work for the same company. I once asked them if I could join them on one of their forays down the manholes. They showed me a small Polaroid photograph of a dead rat which was about one or two feet in length excluding the tail; an empty coke bottle was placed next to it for size relevance. That put an end to my Indiana Jones aspirations!

By: Isa

Isa — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 08:05:53 +0000

I guess it beats that film series which used to be screened on Italian station – The Beauty and the Beast – or a name like that. It was about a half-man, half-beast which lived underground in the famous sewers of Paris. I used to love to see it. Could be some half-man, half-beast lives underneath Valletta, plus a whole population and we don’t know about them?

[Daphne – We would have heard the whining by now.]

By: P

Thu, 19 Feb 2009 07:33:41 +0000

This study confirms what I have been repeating for some months that Valletta is full of huge underground spaces of all shapes and sizes, including underground spaces adjacent to the cathedral itself. And inside the cathedral as well! I was only repeating what is well known by any dilettante and what the “experts” had discovered and reported on. I repeat also that these empty spaces give a good indication of the type of rock that lies below the surface. It wasn’t only the FAA troops who were rash in their conclusions but, unfortunately, also the ‘expert’, who produced a non-report with nothing but opinion and who should have known better.

By: Jes Farrugia

Jes Farrugia — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 06:49:56 +0000

Does this mean that there are spaces which require no excavations? If so, the foundation did really mess up….what kind of research did they do if a graduate knows more than what they presented?

[Daphne – They did know. It was in the plans. But nobody looked because they were too busy listening to Astrid.]

By: Reuben Scicluna

Reuben Scicluna — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 06:45:29 +0000

… at the risk of being called an imbecile …
but wouldn’t such huge holes have been dug before the buildings would have been erected?
Also, if there is a hole the size of the cathedral, can’t that be used to house the tapestries?
Throughout this hole – sorry, I meant whole – business my impression has been that amateurs on either side of the dig/don’t dig divide have screamed louder than the experts. How many of the “dig” parade knew about these underground caverns? How many of the “don’t dig” clan knew about these subterranean dimples? I’d really like to know why this Edward Said chappie kept his mouth shut throughout the whole show… Long ago, an ugly, ugly man called Abraham Lincoln said “Better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak out and remove all doubt.” Major exponents in this farce, take note.

[Daphne – I agree with your last point, which is primarily why I kept silent. I don’t feel qualified to speak about the validity of a museum project, because I’m not. I am, however, qualified to speak about the dangerous derailment of correct procedure by a group of possibly well-intentioned but seriously misguided individuals. We are seeing the growth of a line of thinking that runs equivalent to: a man kills his wife; the rest of us think he is obviously guilty, because come on, nobody else could have killed her; so we insist that the state doesn’t bother with the trial because it’s a waste of money (given that he is guilty) and we all go out and lynch him instead, while some people yell from the sidelines, “No, no, that’s not the way to do things.”]