Look, no ring-kissing or other grovelling body language – and no spouses and assorted children, either
And it’s not because they’re not Catholic (Nick Clegg’s wife is Spanish, so no prizes for guessing how she was brought up). It’s because that sort of behaviour is totally out of order, and because kissing a ruler’s ring is a gesture of submission to him, and not a gesture of respect for a church to which you – however nominally – belong.
I picked this video in particular because Prime Minister Muscat – going by his body language around him – patently has a man-crush (the admiration sort, I hasten to add) on Prime Minister Cameron.
So perhaps he’ll listen.
But just in case Prime Minister Muscat wants to know how those baptised into the Catholic Church do it, here’s Nicolas Sarkozy. And look, despite having a wife really worth showing off (also baptised into the Catholic Church, and who would have probably brightened up the Pope’s day no end), he went alone.
But with Maltese prime ministers and presidents, it’s never a meeting with the Pope. It’s always a “papal audience”.
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Maltese Catholics are not Catholics. They are Maltese Catholics.
Neither are they Homo Sapiens.
Malti-sapiens… :)
True statesmen behave accordingly.
Our Prime Minister is a peasant. And it shows.
How embarrassing.
It is very difficult to find an advisor like Richard Cachia Caruana who knew protocol inside out.
Even the Gonzi administration struggled without him but they managed to get most of it right. Labour don’t know where to begin, let alone accomplish.
Exactly, curious.
I would use ‘peasent’ very sparingly. The continental farmer is neither unrefined nor ignorant apart from those in some remote communities in Sardenia or Romania.
An ignorant or unrefined farmer will not take offence for being called a farmer, Joe.
Rest assured that when I said that Joseph Muscat is a peasant I had absolutely no intention to offend or belittle farmers – none of the farmers I know are arrogant and pretentious, nor do any of them want to become Prime Minister, unlike Joseph Muscat.
Apologies. I meant “a farmer will never take offence for being called a farmer.”
You’ve just pissed off all peasants.
Social interaction skills are probably the most disgusting thing about the Maltese.
When meeting with important people, Maltese men will always be over-familiar, with that “haw Cali” stoop, a double Demarco handshake, and very often a slap on the back too.
When physical contact is not allowed (meeting a sovereign, for instance), they will go into stiff deference mode, adding a Chinese kowtow for good measure.
Maltese women will adopt that strained smile, to emphasise how happy they are to meet The Very Important Man and how different this is from the usual “guys” they, like, meet. Vide Mrs Michelle Muscat with the Pope.
[Daphne – You left something out: the women’s limp, flaccid handshake, with only the forearm extended and the elbow glued to the hip. And the way how, after they do this, they literally take a step back and withdraw mentally and visibly from the encounter, as though they are the pet dog and totally irrelevant.]
I have always found that the upper crust will respond much better to cool detached respect than to overt grovelling. Because that is the way they behave with each other. Anything else and they’ll see the peasant in you.
But then it all starts with good training in social interaction in a professional environment, at which the Maltese fail tragically. You go into an office and it’s “Deff”. You go on TV before someone who doesn’t know you from Adam and you find that surnames and titles are nonexistent. It’s “Deff” again.
It makes you wonder how the Maltese ever managed to work with the British. But that was before the onset of the equality disease, I suppose.
“But then it all starts with good training in social interaction in a professional environment, at which the Maltese fail tragically. You go into an office and it’s “Deff”. You go on TV before someone who doesn’t know you from Adam and you find that surnames and titles are nonexistent. It’s “Deff” again.”
That’s thanks to Xarabank & Bondi+.
At least someone understands. Yes, that’s exactly what I mean.
With regards to the use of English and working with the British: pre-Mintoff, the Maltese knew their place or the codes. There was no confusion and the relationships that worked were based on this. This too, was true of relationships between one Maltese and another.
The subservient dipping of the head when being greeted or being bidden farewell is present to this day and is an element that bothers me.
How lovely the German language, to be able to work alongside someone for 40 years and still maintain the “Sie” and “Herr X” or “Frau X.” Most other languages drop into the informal with the passage of time. A degree of formality does help maintain a professional distance and underline the expectation of ethics in all that one does.
In Malta I surmise that the keenness to get onto a first name basis, and the use of a “Klikka-type” abbreviation, has more to do with a notion of lack of self-confidence and sending a signal of “look, I’m accepted with this lot (finally, because in my heart I know I have my social differences).” Malta is such a small place that people feel need to show this off to establish a spot for themselves.
First name ‘designer’ abbreviations beyond the run of the mill Joey, Peppi and Ganni type were cool with a certain sector. Then others caught on and thought they were handling it “as the others did.”
Others have a horror of abbreviations and inwardly shudder at the uninvited use of them.
Tghid kellmu bhal Renzo Piano, u qallu “Ghax ha nghidlek, Frensis.”
http://www4.pictures.gi.zimbio.com/Pope+Benedict+XVI+Carla+Bruni+Sarkozy+Pope+2xzPb4JT3mDl.jpg
Sarkozy can’t walk either. He enters as though he’s on the beach with a cooler full of beer under one arm and a couple of deckchairs in the other.
At least our Joey’s in good company there.
With his popularity level falling fast, Dr Muscat will have to do more grovelling and kissing of papal rings.
Nick Clegg and the Pope both sat down at the same time so that neither of them took precedence. Just good manners and mutual respect. No fawning and forelock-tugging and bending of the knee, not even from the Pope.
In light of what we saw a few months ago when Mintoff’s friends, colleagues and hangers-on appeared all over the newspapers bearing watches and other gifts given to Malta by foreign governments (because Mintoff didn’t like them), someone should ask Joseph Muscat what he intends to do with the three pontifical medals given to Malta by the pope.
Furthermore, I would like to ask Joseph Muscat and George Vella how they square kissing Mintoff’s coffin one day with kissing the pope’s ring on another day.
Although they might have been misguided, Eddie Fenech Adami’s and Lawrence Gonzi’s meetings with the pope were at least genuine, honest and well-intentioned meetings by pious Catholics who believed they were serving Malta well by kissing the pope’s ring.
Labour, on the other hand, made a dog’s dinner of ransacking and ridiculing the Curia (George Vella is old enough to remember that) in the golden years and have been making an even bigger dog’s dinner of divorce, anal sex and transsexuals’ right to marry in the last year or so.
How does any of that fit in with the adulation shown towards the pope a few days ago?
Nick Clegg does not share his wife’s religion.
[Daphne -Nobody said he did, Foggy. And nobody said that his wife is Catholic, either.]