The rude cashier is not the rule (1)

Oh dear, here we go again! A frequent visitor to Malta from England has a letter published in this paper in which he says “being polite to (shop) customers does not seem to feature a lot here”.

He quotes one example from one supermarket and one cashier. My own experience, admittedly not in Malta but in Gozo, where I live as a foreign resident, is very different. Yes, there is the occasional taciturn shopworker, who may be feeling harassed or is having a bad hair day, but in the vast majority of cases my thanks are met by a “Y’welcome”. And if I use a few words in Maltese beyond grazzi the response is usually pleased surprise (it is actually polite to try to learn something of the language of the country you are living in).

Generalisations are a curse. “Germans have no sense of humour.” “Britons (and Maltese) are obese.” “The British were imperialists, only interested in exploiting the Maltese.” “The Maltese shoot out of the skies everything that flies”. (There is plenty of evidence to show that most Maltese do not approve of this. If you want to know why the gun-happy minority continue their activities, you have to ask the politicians.)

“What can you expect? This is Malta.” How many times have I heard that, from Britons residing in Malta, speaking about driving standards on the roads, or lack of punctuality, or potholes, or almost any situation you care to name? My answer to them is: “If that’s how you feel about it, why do you live here? Nobody is forcing you.” And in any case, I feel a lot safer driving in Malta than I do in London.

“Maltese are cruel to animals.” Well, my experience, and I have visited every school in Gozo to speak to children about animal welfare, is totally the opposite. “The Catholic Church turns a blind eye to child abuse.” The list goes on and on.

I would ask everybody who hears a generalisation to stop and think for a moment, because most generalisations are only partly true or are misleading and in fact harmful, because they distort the truth and stop people from the bother of thinking for themselves.