Not so streetwise after all

I was raised on Monopoly. My cousins and I took it very seriously - some games lasted whole weekends. Morning would turn into night and then we'd be back to the Monopoly board the next day. We even went overboard - we sort of pre-empted all the local realtors and would advertise our hotels on posters and display them all over my aunt's dining room.

Every so often I get this craving for a good game of Monopoly, in the same way I sometimes crave a Fruit Pastille or an Opal Fruit (which now has become Startburst).

What is it with changing names? I have a profuse loathing for name changing. I find it so unnecessary and stupid. It's like you're wiping out history in one fell swoop and, whether you like it or not, the old is always going to sound right, better somehow, and even if it doesn't, it's stuck - there to stay. It's just one of those things. It's the reason Edward Fenech Adami will always be Eddie and Prince of Wales will never be Manoel Dimech Street. Forget about it. And I suppose now, it's also true of MLP and PL.

Whereas PN is a Maltese abbreviation, MLP is an English one. All these years, Labour's image has been inextricably linked to an English acronym. It's something I never really gave much thought to until now. The Maltese equivalent of MLP was always Partit Laburista, but its abbreviated form was clearly a reference to the Malta Labour Party. Unlike the case of PN - which refers to Partit Nazzjonalista, not the Nationalist Party.

Now, Labour have done away with MLP and are going with PL. Not sure about that one. There goes another part of history and my youth. At school, around election time in 1987, the school bullies might have taken you aside and asked you whether you were partial to Peanuts (PN) or Maltese lollypops (MLP).

I distinctly remember where I was standing when the question was put to me in Year 5. Election time usually sends everyone into a state of paranoia and frenzy at the best of times. The older generation are coached and warned time and again not to cross their 7s, to go easy with the 4s and the 1s.

I foresee panic - they've removed part of the emblem, they've changed the name; it's a recipe for disaster.

I hear we have our own autochthonous Monopoly board game for sale. The first I heard of it was a few days ago on a local radio station. And the first thing I wondered about were the roads. You see, in Malta, we seem hell-bent on trampling on the good and old only to replace with the new and ugly.

It's true of most everything here, especially the street names. I am not sure who is responsible for these in Malta, and whether it's a he, she or they - but the last 20 years or so have seen the historical, the quaint, the charming, the descriptive and the pretty, massacred and replaced with the dull, heavy-sounding-guaranteed-to-leave-you-cold names. Names and surnames, the likes of Triq Manoel Dimech, Triq Sir Paul Boffa, Triq George Borg Olivier, Triq Luiġi Camilleri Preziosi, Triq Dun Karm Psaila. On an on it goes.

And naturally, there must be about 50 or more streets named after Borg Olivier et al, in different localities around Malta. Because what the Maltese lack in taste, they certainly don't make up for in imagination.

I want the old names back. I want Britannia Street, Victoria Avenue, Strada Reale (formerly San Giorgio) Prince of Wales to name a few. Mercifully, most of the Valletta and Floriana names seem to have remained intact. Strait Street, Old Bakery, Gunlayer Street (Triq il-Miratur), Magazines Street (Triq il-Magazzini).

Gozo has also retained many of its original names - Għajn Melel, Triq Ċimċem, Triq Ċiċċiano, Triq l-Għarus. Now imagine replacing an interesting name like Ċimċem, probably a nickname associated with a family in Nadur, easily hundreds of years old, with the name of someone which tells you nothing about the place. To me, it borders the sacrilegious. It reminds me of that Maltese expression about knocking down a church to rebuild another.

I have nothing against paying tribute to our forefathers when it comes to the newer areas like Pembroke, Swieqi, Buġibba and Misraħ Kola. But this can't be at the expense of history.

It's utter madness, not to mention potentially dangerous. You send an ambulance to Triq Ġ. Cardona, Sliema, but nobody in the neighbourhood knows where it is, not even the people who live in the next road. Although if you asked them for St Ignatius Junction, their brain would definitely twig. And much as fire-engines and ambulances should be equipped with The Maze or its equivalent, it's not always that simple.

I live in Sliema and I'd have been able to direct you to most, if not all of the streets, once upon a time. Not today I'm afraid.

So, back to Monopoly. I hope some serious thought has been given to the roads, because the idea of building a five-star hotel in Triq il-Barmil or Triq il-Ġogi (which is a reference to one's joints - can you think of anything less attractive?) really doesn't float my boat, hat, boot or car. When you're competing with Park Lane, Mayfair, Piccadilly and Pall Mall, you're really going to have to pull out all the stops.

I wonder what Chance and Community Chest (or would that be the Community Chest Fund?) will yield. It should be interesting. Mepa, Mistra, the Ball of the August Moon, Paceville, tuna fish, free Park and Ride, bit of Gozo lace interwoven for good measure... I'm already dreaming of a double six.