MALTA: Mnarja Is The National Festival Of Malta

The Summer weather couldn’t have been any better as a gentle breeze came over the beaches of the Mediterranean, through the countryside, and up a hill to Mdina, the old capital of Malta. It was late afternoon, and the medieval wall town was bustling with locals getting ready for one of the oldest and most important holidays still celebrated in Malta and the nearby Island of Gozo. The occasion? Mnarja, a national festival dedicated to the feast of Saint Peters and St. Paul. Mnarja, sometimes called luminarja, is derived from the Latin word Luminare (to light up), which is why on June 29th of every year, dating back to the 16th century and the rule of the Knights, candles and bonfires have been lit in appreciation of the Saints.

Maltese cuisine, religion and music are also a big part of the celebration. Historically, Mnarja was the one day of the year when the Maltese could hunt and eat wild rabbit, which was traditionally reserved for the Knights. In its early years, the festival was also a good luck charm for new brides and grooms. Brides would often wear their wedding dresses to the festival to bring luck to their marriages. Mnarja was also one of the few times of year where “ghana,” the traditional Maltese folk music, was played.

As I stood in the thick of an enthusiastic crowd with a beer in one hand and four horses speeding right towards us, I didn’t realize what I was in for. On Mnarja, horse and donkey races take place on an old straight line street down the hill from Mdina and steal much of the attention of the festival goers. Contenders in jockey uniforms ride on makeshift chariots behind their horses as they vie for the Palju, a banner presented as the trophy to the winners of each category that was once presented by the Grand Master of the Order himself. I immediately felt included as a policeman began chatting me up about his picks for the races. I stood on the fence line taking it in– the aroma from the rabbit grilling at the food stands, the racing horses, and the extremely friendly, lively crowd.

As the races carried on into the night, I walked back up the hill into Mdina, only to find an orchestra playing outside in front of a cathedral to hundreds of onlookers. Maltese children were all playing in the nearby playground while parents and grandparents caught up on news from the races and the happenings of the festival thus far.

By this time it was dark and the orchestra was pitted to a backdrop of several miles of countryside and the lights from the races on the road down the hill. The orchestra played a mixture of traditional Maltese ghana as well as some modern classics. As I stared out over Malta and the Mediterranean, listening to “At Last,” from a woman with a voice who rivaled Etta’s, I had no choice but to fall in love with Malta… and Mnarja.

MALTA: No Tourist Spillover To Malta After Tunisia Attack

38 tourists were killed when an armed gunman attacked a tourist resort in Sousse

Despite closure of hotels in Tunisia local operators not expecting surge in tourist arrivals.

A recent terror attack on a Tunisian beach resort does not appear to have significantly boosted tourist arrivals to Malta.

“We might have gained a trickle of tourists who would have otherwise visited Tunisia, perhaps 5,000 people,” tourism entrepreneur and Nationalist MP Robert Arrigo told MaltaToday. “It’s a boost, but pittance when one considers that around 180,000 tourists arrive in Malta every July. We’re certainly not experiencing a tourism rush that outsiders might have imagined.”

Tunisia’s tourism industry has suffered a massive blow since a gunman killed 38 tourists at a resort on 26 June, an attack that ISIS has claimed responsibility for.

Tunisia is expected to lose some 2 million tourist nights over the next year, as European governments warned last week that the North African country is no longer a safe destination.

23 hotels have already shuttered since the attack, and the Tunisian Hotel Federation has claimed that practically no European tourists remain in the country.

Yet, despite sharing a Mediterranean climate with Tunisia, Malta does not seem to have benefitted from a tourism spillover effect. A Malta International Airport spokesperson confirmed that no flights have been added to their schedule since 26 June. While passenger arrivals have increased, they have been on the rise for the past few years, rendering it impossible for the airport to isolate the impact of the Tunisia effect.

Similarly, an Air Malta spokesperson said that they have continued to receive flight bookings normally and have not experienced any effects following the Tunisia attack.

“We continue to monitor the situation and will react accordingly should the need arises,” he said.

Arrigo, managing director of Robert Arrigo & Sons, explained that Malta and Tunisia don’t share the same tourist clientele.

“Most tourist who visit Tunisia are after a cheap Mediterranean holiday,” he said. “A two-week stay at a four-star Tunisian beach resort costs around €400, around the same price as an Air Malta flight to London. Therefore, tourists searching for an alternative holiday to Tunisia would probably first look at Greece, then Spain, then Turkey, and then Malta.”

Malta Hotels Association President Tony Zahra also said that the Tunisia spillover only had a “marginal” impact on Maltese tourism, if that.

“Malta’s hotel bookings were already very high before the attacks, and we didn’t conduct an empirical study to ascertain whether they rose by some 1% or 2% after the attack. Either way, any spillover wasn’t significant.”