Needed - some more sense in the city

It is faintly disquieting to read the Finance Minister's reaction to the dramatic increase in food prices. This increase is real and not a scurrilous rumour put about by Charlon Gouder or some bitter opposition politician with an unhealthy obsession with the cost of life. Recently published Eurostat figures show that Malta registered the second highest increase in food prices in the eurozone. Prices rose by 9.7 per cent in the 12-month period ending last April, compared with a 6.2 per cent increase in the eurozone.

We don't know why prices are so much higher here than the rest of Europe. As Denise Richards, the woman who was once voted the worst Bond girl ever, describes her reality show, "It's complicated". A number of factors could be affecting the price of our food stuffs. The European Commission pointed out one of them - namely that Malta's size makes it easier for a few food importers to dominate the market, thus hindering healthy competition (a bit like the political scene really, but I don't want to make the major party people wail about the dangers of instability).

When he was contacted about the price hikes - the same ones that some commentators were foreseeing before the election and being derided as misery guts for their trouble - Tonio Fenech said that the Competition Authority was looking into the matter to check whether there was a lack of competition which was impinging on local food prices. So far, so predictable. Promises of reports, studies and investigations are the standard ministerial reaction to most problems.

But then, Fenech had a Marie Antoinette moment. No, he didn't tell us to eat cake but he did indicate what he thought could help us out in this era of high cheese prices and expensive electricity. No - Fenech said that the German chain supermarket Lidl, renowned for competitive prices, could possibly put pressure on the market to stabilise prices and keep them from continuing to spiral.

Now I don't harbour any strong pro or anti Lidl feelings, but find it odd that a minister seems to think that it's the only establishment that can drive down prices and which is worthy of mention. I bet the other supermarket owners are fuming at the free publicity given to their new competitor.

• On Friday evening a fortnight ago, I realised I couldn't face another TV programme about the dreary affair that was the MLP leadership race or the cluelessness of the PN government in the face of rising food and energy prices, and headed for something more pleasant.

So I fled from the dross on the small screen, to something more entertaining on the big screen. The local premiere of Sex in The City was being held at the Eden Century cinemas and it looked like I was not the only one in search of a couple of hours of escapism - hundreds of girls thronged the theatre.

As expected, the show was a frothy piece which was rather big on product-placement. If you don't like to watch ads at the cinema then don't watch this film. Give it a wide berth, too, if you are after gritty, hard-nosed, realistic productions. This isn't one of them. Suffice to say that it features a man who realises that women lust after walk-in wardrobes. Such creatures don't exist outside the world of celluloid. True-to-life this film is not.

However, there was one aspect of behaviour which it reflected quite realistically - this being the overweening importance which women (and yes, it is mainly women) give to their wedding day. Just like Carrie in the movie, they fantasise, fuss and fret over what is irritatingly called "the big day". They're spending huge amounts of money on what is essentially a big party and a dress which they wear once.

In the months before they get hitched their stress levels rocket as they run around meeting the seamstress, the caterer, the florist, the printer, the photographer, the videographer, the souvenir-maker and all those assorted characters who are supposed to elevate their wedding day to memorable heights. Every wedding has to be more costly, more original and more organised than the previous one. Innovative touches have to be added to the fripperies, such as butterfly confetti, so that one's wedding stands out from the rest. It all seems so over the top.

I'm not knocking the wish to celebrate an important day or advocating that anyone regards weddings as non-events, but I think that a sense of proportion wouldn't go amiss.

Because if the greatest difficulty that a girl has overcome is whether to wear a tiara or a veil (and then even that is decided by her wedding planner), she's going to pieces when the real problems crop up. How will she cope with illness, work, child-rearing and domestic problems if her most insurmountable problem to date had been how to transform her wedding day into a romantic fantasy? Like films, weddings should be considered as a temporary escape from our every day and perhaps humdrum life. But it's the latter which lasts.

cl.bon@nextgen.net.mt