I.M. Beck quote unquote

It's rare that I agree with Doctor Alfred Sant. In fact, apart from his nomination of Dr Giovanni Bonello to the bench of the European Court of Human Rights and his attempt to provoke a civil discussion on divorce, I can't think of anything, offhand, on which I agreed with him in the past.

This week sees one more point on which I agree with the Leader of the Opposition: he called for a full investigation into the tragedy in Valletta on New Year's Day, when a young woman fell to her death from the bastions. I was tempted, when I first spotted the news report, to sneer this off as a piece of grand-standing, but this time, he's right and no two ways about it.

The investigation needs to focus on quite a few areas.

Firstly, it needs to focus on why - for I don't know how many years in succession - permission was granted for thousands of young people to congregate in the vicinity of a sheer and fatal drop with easy and (theoretically) unlimited access to alcohol without precautions being taken to make the drop inaccessible.

A sign saying "Danger - sheer drop" doesn't even begin to cut it: drunk, semi-drunk or even mildly exuberant teenagers don't read or take notice of signs, especially in the dark.

Secondly, the investigation needs to focus not only on why permission was granted but on who was responsible for granting it without taking even the most elementary of precautions. Is the system to blame: did the left hand have a rudimentary idea of what the right hand was doing? Did everyone assume that everyone else was responsible for health and safety, with the net result being that nobody was?

Thirdly, the investigation needs to focus on precisely what was going on during this party in the first place. I have heard, from young people who were there, that the drinks that were available from the so-called "open bar" were not drinks that you would expect to be served from a five-star hotel bar, to put it mildly. Not to put too fine a point on it, from what I heard, the booze available was mind-blowing and, while I might (or might not) mean that in the metaphoric sense, I certainly don't mean it in a complimentary one.

Also from what I heard, the food available to soak up the alcohol was just about a million miles away from being anywhere even in the same universe as sufficient.

Mix all of the above together, combine them with the time, place and general atmosphere, and you have a tragedy waiting to happen, which, sadly, it did.

What does it take for things to be done properly, for every parent's nightmare not to become horrific reality? People, young and old, will get themselves into situations where they will hurt themselves and no amount of foresight will completely exclude people from putting themselves in harm's way, but some things are obvious to even the meanest of intelligences.

Perhaps if the same level of effort were to be put into making sure that public venues are safe as is put into handing out parking tickets or stopping people having a fag, unhealthy as that practice is, the public would be better served.

But then, revenue isn't raised directly by making somewhere safe and you don't get nice Euro-friendly awards like you do by appeasing the anti-tobacco lobby.

Better late

Switching the subject completely, here's my annual exhortation to you to trot out, if you haven't already, and get hold of Judge Bonello's sixth volume of bits of our history.

This year, I thought that what with my half-century approaching and the general habit of handing out valuable consideration to mark the birth of Christ, I'd hold off from buying the book myself, so as to save myself the embarrassment of trying to look surprised and the trouble of having to exchange it when I get one as a present.

No such luck, of course, so when the present giving season subsided, I duly presented myself to one of the many Agenda outlets and bought one, while stopping myself from buying more books and magazines at the same time, as I seem to have to do whenever I wander into these Aladdin's Caves.

You will not be surprised to learn that the expedition was worth the effort. As always, the erudition of the research is sneakily undermined by the throwaway lines that skulk, like the Artful Dodger, in the text, making you read back with a grin slowly dawning over your face. The nuggets of irreverence that lie just below the surface make for compelling reading, even though this is history.

Now that Judge Bonello's distinguished tenure at the European Bench is coming to its end, may I humbly submit for his honour's consideration, as I have before, that it is about time that he dedicates himself to writing about his own history?

With all due respect, that is.

Oh come on

We're still suffering the effects of the silly season, I know, but does that excuse Kullhadd from leading, on its front page, with a story about two teenage girls who ended up getting AIDS because they had intercourse with the same, infected, foreigner?

This is a terrible human tragedy, of course, but of what conceivable news value is it? It's not as if the disease-carrier was identified or identifiable, allowing other people to be warned off. All we got from the story was that two girls had contracted a sexually transmitted disease, which takes us nowhere.

If the story had been carried 20 years ago, I might have seen some point to it, as a warning about this new and terrible disease, but surely, in 2006, there isn't anyone who hasn't heard about AIDS? Anyone who reads Kullhadd or any newspaper, that is. Ill-educated young people don't read newspapers, not even Kullhadd, and the story about these two sad people, so it's possible that there is ignorance about AIDS still lurking, but this front-page story does nothing to remedy this.

So I have to consider the possibility that the only reason that this story made the front page was that it was felt to be one that would sell papers. Being as the political parties were still keeping themselves quiet, an appropriate seasonal blessing when you think about it, only sex and prurient scandal remained available as bankers for the people responsible for Kullhadd.

Good bits

A few uplifting bits to end a moderately depressing effort this week. No restaurants to recommend this week, but if you want a pretty good take-away pizza, go over to the Istanbul Kebab House on the road from Naxxar to Mosta, on the right as you leave the main part of Naxxar. Fine stuff and the kebabs are pretty good too.

There are no restaurants to recommend simply because we celebrated the New Year in the company of friends at a private home and I'd have praised the catering no end if it were available to the public, which it ain't so I won't.

I trust that you all enjoyed the soccer surfeit with which we were regaled over the holiday season.

I know I did, but I support Chelsea, so I suppose that's understandable. As for the rest of you, hey, I'm sorry.

Finally, congratulations to Joseph Calleja, surely one of our more effective ambassadors, on his participation in the New Year's Day concert transmitted by Rai to all Europe from Venice.

bocca@waldonet.net.mt