I've just eaten an orange straight off the tree.  I swear nothing in the world beats a Maltese orange for taste and goodness. It packs a load of sensation, warmth, optimism and good feeling.

Which fills me with a sense of optimism and good feeling for the rest of my country.  Malta is really a tiny rocky island.  It produces very little.  But what it does produce is of very high quality... I would even say excellence.

I cringe when I see some of my countrymen belittling our native land because it is so small, perhaps claustrophobic, and seems to lack so much that other nations have in abundance.  They miss the point completely.  They seem to forget that our very littleness is our greatness.

What other population of less than half a million  has it's own national identity, it's own culture, it's very own language complete with centuries old literature. What other tiny island has held on to it's own characteristics through all the viscisitudes of history... has  in fact influenced history.

I like to call Malta a cameo... an excellent work of art in miniature  - packed with  excellence and good feeling.... much like a Maltese orange.