Features
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Pets for cuddles – and confiding in
Millions of dog and cat owners prefer cuddling their pets to their children or loved ones when feeling down, a new survey in the UK claimed today. And a quarter (24 per cent) treat their animals more like a child, according to the findings of the...
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Monkeys show signs of speech
Friendly lip-smacks made by a large African monkey show striking similarities with human speech, say scientists. Geladas, close cousins of the baboon that only live in the remote mountains of Ethiopia, produce “unnerving” sounds that can easily be...
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The Royal Malta Artillery’s role in the Battle for Malta
On April 3, 1942, at the peak of the Battle for Malta, King George VI sent a message to the Governor and Commander-in-Chief of Malta to inform him that he had been watching with admiration the stout-hearted resistance of all in Malta, service...
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The here and now
David Pisani www.davidpisani.com Does a photographer choose a location or vice versa? It’s a bit of both. Photographers are by nature curious minds, constantly seeking a place that allows them to express deeper ideas about the world or humanity...
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Shoot to thrill
Chairman and founder of the Malta Institute of Professional Photography Kevin Casha shares an album that spans more than three decades of professional photography. Do you remember the first photograph you shot? To be honest, I don’t. And anyway, I’m...
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Frame it
Joe Smith If you had to choose a favourite photo from your portfolio, which would it be? I have a good number of favourite images, but somehow I keep returning to this one I took of the Burj Al Arab hotel in Dubai. I love shooting architecture for...
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The shining
A lot of the jewellery pieces that you have photographed for the Vanity, Profanity & Worship exhibition have rarely been seen before – was the process of photographing them akin to a rediscovery? For me, it wasn’t a rediscovery as I had never been...
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Want a pet? Adopt an endangered elephant
Anna, Bella, Cinta, Dadang and Elena are five Indonesian elephants available for “adoption” as part of a conservation project to save endangered Asian elephants and allow them to remain living in the wild. While African elephants face growing danger...
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Jewellery from the Maltese islands
Today sees the opening of the eagerly anticipated Fondazzjoni Patrimonju Malti exhibition. The exhibition, which was designed in-house by the foundation’s CEO Michael Lowell, is all about the history of jewellery in Malta. It features a spectacular...
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Modern classics – The Hours
Paula Fleri-Soler pays tribute to the film that celebrates the genius and the anguish of one of the world’s biggest literary female figures, Virginia Woolf. “A woman’s whole life in a single day. Just one day. And in that day her whole life.” So...
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Chinese gunboats off Malta in 1879
On September 27, 1879, the British newspaper The Graphic ran a news feature stating that four gunboat vessels built by Sir William Armstrong and Co. of Laird, Birkenhead, the UK, for the Chinese Government, had berthed in the Malta harbour after...
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An international Easter
Jo Caruana meets two foreigners, who have made Malta their home, to discover the Easter traditions they have brought with them – from colourful egg hunts to cakes topped in marzipan. Patti Piazzi, originally from Southeast Asia, and her Italian...
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Feasting away
Easter is one of the holiest weeks of the year for Christians around the world, and there are as many different ways to celebrate as there are countries, if not more. Here are some of the biggest and boldest ways in which people remember the...
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Faith and folklore, pomp and pageantry
Holy Week in the Maltese islands is a visible cycle marked by an amalgamation of religious beliefs and spectacular pageantry. Few other local traditions show the same signs of vitality, change and motion as that of the Good Friday processions with...
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The true spirit of Holy Week
The Last Supper table at the Oratory of St Dominic’s Priory in Valletta is an exciting display that comes to life every year during Easter. Simonne Pace meets Ivan Grixti, who is entrusted with the day-to-day running of the Archconfraternity of the...
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Origins of Holy Week processions and statues
Since the earliest days of Christianity, the Passion, Death and Resurrection of Our Lord Jesus Christ have been observed as the greatest and most solemn feast of the year. However scanty the information about the first century may be, the earliest...
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Modern classics – Strictly Ballroom
Director Baz Lurhmann is admired for his uniquely flamboyant style. Paula Fleri-Soler reminisces about one of his first forays into film, Strictly Ballroom. Australian director Baz Luhrmann is known for the unique, colourful and flamboyant style he...
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Profumo scandal is 50 years old
It is half a century since John Profumo, Secretary of State for War, lied in the House of Commons about having an affair with the call girl Christine Keeler. The denial resulted in the exposure of a searing story of sex, suicide, intrigue and...
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Iraq struggles to recover from its years of conflict
More needs to be done to help Iraq recover from years of conflict, an Iraqi said on the eve of the 10th anniversary of the war. Nameer Sallu said people in parts of Iraq are struggling with no water or electricity and the country still needs help...
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Wartime experiences of a Maltese officer in the British Army
Though he turned 90 on January 27 this year, Major Stanley Clews is still very active, and I found him to be surprisingly alert when I interviewed him on his wartime experiences at his residence in Sliema a couple of months ago. Clews was born in...
