Wrapping up the year in Malta

We had a great Christmas even though it seemed to short and quick.  We've been on the road  (away from Malta) since Nov 23 and after the 30+ hr journey back we are thrilled to be back in our new home.

We packed up our 4 checked baggage during a 6hr process and ended up leaving far more behind than we would have liked but with a 23kg limit per bag we had no choice.  We arrived around 2pm with our 4 huge (heavy) bags, 2 carry-ons and 2 backpacks.  We went to the rental car counter to collect our car for the week and Mark had rented us a Toyota Aygo.  It was super cute but silly small; we managed to get all of our luggage in without too much trouble but we couldn't have fit another item of any kind.  The car is actually a great size for our life here and has moved to the top of our list when we finally settle on something.  Getting back behind the wheel on the right hand side of the car was a little weird again but I took to it pretty well (toot-toot)!  We found our apartment again with ease thanks to our handy dandy Garmin and enjoyed the views the whole way home.

As we landed the pilot said the temp on the island was 15C (59F) and we weren't sure if that would be cold or not.  We've lost touch a little with what the numbers in temperatures feel like and were pleasantly surprised - it felt great!!  ...until we got home.

When we finally got our heavy ass bags up the stairs leading to our building, barely packed into the elevator and then into the apt. we were hungry!  Instead of running off to the store right away and then cooking something we decided to order a pizza and settle in a bit.  Boy were we disappointed to discover that the two pizza places we have numbers for will not deliver until after 7pm.  :(  Welcome to Europe.  :)  Luckily I had a frozen pizza in the freezer so we weren't too put off.

A note about our house: every wall in our home is made from cinderblocks or windows and our floors are made of tiles.  we have no AC or central heat of any kind - we never thought it would be a problem because we're tough...  We learned at about 7:30p that we were not that tough!  I'm here to tell you that insulation is an important part of a house!  Thankfully the apartment came with a small propane fueled space heater, on rollers.  We finally fired that baby up and set it next to us until bedtime and them moved it to the bedroom while we brushed our teeth before turning it off for the night.

We spent our evening unpacking and got almost all of it done and put away (yay us!!).  Before we went out to the grocery store we both needed some serious showers.  We couldn't take one straight away when we got home because we had turned off our water heaters (as you do when you travel here and in Dubai) and of course we needed to give them time to warm back up.  After a couple of hours, right before we were going to take a shower, I noticed that the water in the sinks were running really slow.  When we checked the shower it was barely spitting out!!  We did the duty and walked around the house a couple of times checking all the piping and valves we could find.  Being at a loss we finally called the landlord so he could at least get out in the morning and fix our problem.  We had decided we could fill up the bath tub (rather slowly) and at least get a rough cleaning to get us thru until the problem could be fixed.  Mark called and spoke to the lovely man and explained we had been out of town and now that we were home the water wasn't working, maybe some work was being done on the building to cause water disruption?  Tony (the landlord) asked if we had turned on the pump?  "What pump?"  This is the first we had heard of a pump of any kind!!!  In the end it was one of the lighted switches on the wall that we took to be for the non-existant AC wall unit...  We flipped the switch and our water pressure was back and we scampered off to the shower!  Welcome to Europe.  :)

 We turned it off and jumped under the blanket-S.  In order from flesh touching to top sheet: we had our beloved blue fuzzy blanke from Mom, a standard flat sheet, a light red quilt-styled blanket and then our down alternative blanket (thankfully) brought back from the States.  :)  We were actually quite toasty and slept well, quite well, we were asleep for just over 12 hrs, much needed sleep.

We woke up at noon, not because we were done sleeping but because it was noon - that is an oddity for us to sleep like that.  We stubbled out in our long pjs, thermal shirts and heavy socks (I actually had on 3 shirts but whatever- Mark wore a robe for awhile too)  After a couple cups of Mark's sweet cappuccinos, some Oj and eggs and toast we were ready to get moving.  Mark has been fighting me on the validity of my opinion that he needs some sweaters and long sleeve shirts but after our first night back he was ready to go shopping!  We went to the only shopping area we are aware of and started looking for a parking spot, not an easy task in this part of the world.  We were happy to find a hidden parking garage attached to a multi level grocery store and although it was pay it was worth it to us to be able to move on with our task at hand.  We spiraled up to level 4 before we found a spot (the garage only had 5 levels), we jumped in the elevator and headed down to start our shopping adventure.  Little did we know that we would first encounter a 20 minute adventure trying to figure out what floor and how we should exit the elevator and then the store.  The grocery store is 3 or 4 levels and the signs in the 'vator don't give you a clear idea of where you need to be to exit the store.  They say that level -2 is the main exit but when you get to level -2 you find that is not the case, back to the 'vator.  Then be careful because there is a 2 and a -2; 2 is not the exit either.  Review the sign again and it still says -2 is the main exit, check again, no dice, back to the 'vator.  Soon we were landing on every floor and walking out to look around - all we wanted was to go shopping!  After 20 minutes we found the exit on floor 0 which is also the ground floor - boy that would have been easier if there was a sign that said 'Exit Street Level -- 0 or GF'  Welcome to Europe.  :)

I'm happy to say that we did find him a handful of sweaters and the much needed Duvet cover we had been searching for.  Finding our car was not as difficult, and our drive back home was easy and direct.  Back at home we donned our jams (I moaned about needing fuzzy ones) dished up some chili, turned on our space heater and chilled out with some Apple TV - we love it even though it appears we will not be able to take advantage of Netflix.  All in all a fantastic first day back - we LOVE Malta!  :)

Now, because we slept so late we are up late - it's 1am.  Tomorrow is a school day and we are going to be grumpy in the morning.  Oh well the fireworks should make up for it!

HAPPY NEW YEARS EVE!!!

XOXOXXO