When in Doubt, Malta — Karen Rose Green

Here’s an overly specific piece of travel advice that probably only applies to me: Don’t ever stay in central Bulgaria for five weeks with hardly any plans and no one to talk to and think that you won’t start to get the crazies.

Last week, halfway through my brilliant plan to do nothing but be a hermit in Plovdiv, I started to feel the crazies coming on strong. Despite my best efforts, I was feeling isolated and bored and starting to get a little depressed. I still had two weeks left of my nonrefundable AirBNB reservation, but those two weeks were beginning to seem unendurable. I had a decision to make: I could either grit my teeth and stay put, spending two hours of each day writing and the rest wandering around the city looking into shop windows and gazing longingly at groups of laughing friends like a lost, lonely Dickensian orphan, or I could do ANYTHING EXCEPT THAT FIRST OPTION.

So, I started to search various budget airlines in Europe to see what the cheapest roundtrip ticket would be from Sofia, anything to get me out of Bulgaria for a few days. Dublin was sold out and Paris was too expensive, but tickets to Naples were available and only $50. I can go to Italy for $50?! I thought. What a time to be alive.

I had the tickets all loaded in my cart when I decided to do a quick Google search for “Naples travel.” Unfortunately, the general consensus amongst travelers is that Naples is, how shall I put this, a steaming shit hole where you’re sure to be robbed of every possession you've ever owned. As naive as this might sound, I didn't even know there were parts of Italy that were shitty. I just assumed all of Italy was like one giant pizza playground dotted with beautiful Roman fountains and peaceful vineyards. You really do learn new things when you travel. I deleted the tickets from my cart and restarted my search.

The second cheapest roundtrip was Malta. Wait, where is Malta exactly? A quick search revealed that it's south of Italy, an island country in the Mediterranean, meaning that it was sure to be warmer than my current gray, chilly location and I could see no evidence of it being called a shit hole by any travel bloggers. Good enough for me. I bought tickets for Tuesday through Saturday of the following week and felt an immediate sense of relief. It wasn’t exactly in my travel budget to take a vacation within my vacation, but sometimes you have to prioritize your sanity over your budget.

I arrived in Malta early on a Tuesday morning, bleary-eyed, sleep deprived, and recovering from a night spent out with a bunch of 20-something Canadians who were staying at the same hostel as I was in Sofia the night before. (Here’s another travel tip that applies specifically to me: You are too old for that hostel shit. Stick to AirBNB.) Even in my decrepit state, I was immediately able to appreciate the sparkling blue of the Mediterranean and the fact that Malta’s bus system was incredibly easy to navigate. I found the hostel that I’d booked in advance (the last one I'll ever stay in) and crawled into bed, making a point not to speak to anyone, lest they try to convince me to drink cheap beers with them until 3:00am. Nope, not falling for that one again.

My second day in Malta, fully rested and restored to life, wandering aimlessly and happily around Malta’s historic capital, I realized that this was the first time on my trip that I had really allowed myself to just...travel, be a tourist, enjoy myself. I was a month and a half into my big travel adventure and aside from one afternoon in England when I toured Jane Austen’s house (lovely, highly recommended), every other day had been spent trying to accomplish something. Each of my destinations up until this point had been strategic, geared toward a specific goal.

A few days before, when my boredom led me to wonder why I left on this crazy trip in the first place, I forced myself to be completely, embarrassingly honest and write down all the things that, in my deepest heart of hearts, I knew I hoped to accomplish on this trip. The list went something like this:

Finish an entire memoir about being a Peace Corps volunteer in Bulgaria.

Figure out the nature of God and what my personal relationship to that God should be.

Develop meaningful spiritual practice that brings inner peace.

Stop getting depressed.

Maintain a daily, self-directed yoga practice, be able to do one of those Instagram-worthy back bendy poses (but don’t post it on Instagram).

Get into running again, five miles a day should do it.

Post witty, relevant essay on blog at least once a week.

Meet a handsome fellow traveler (Possibly Dutch? Maybe Swiss?), fall in love, transition relationship to post-travel, real life in the same geographic location (preferably Portland because living abroad sounds like too much paperwork).

Floss every night.

Read one book a week.

Write in journal everyday.

Quit drinking (maybe for good or maybe just get it under control, whatever that looks like).

Identify fulfilling career and begin plan to attain said career.

I mean, those are all worthy goals, but not really something you can accomplish all at once in the space of a few months. Not to mention that none of them actually had anything to do with travel. So, on my second day in Malta, I decided to ditch the To Do list and resolve to simply enjoy myself.

And that’s what I did.

I spent my time in Malta wandering the neighborhood around my hostel, down narrow streets lined by regal stone homes with beautiful arched entryways and adorable balconies. I ate a delicious cheeseburger in an outdoor restaurant overlooking the Mediterranean where I made the life-changing discovery that I like to eat my fries with mayonnaise. That's right. I’ve never liked ketchup with my fries, so I’ve always eaten them plain, knowing that something was missing from my life, and now I know what that thing was. It was mayonnaise.

Cheeseburgers and the Mediterranean go together like fries and mayonnaise.

In Malta's historic capital, Valletta, I went from garden to garden, sitting in the sun and watching cats play along the city's ancient stone walls. I toured St. John’s cathedral and saw an original Caravaggio painting, which my electronic tour guide device said was a big deal, though I was more impressed with the paintings depicting a woman named St. Catherine.

St. Catherine "arguing with the philospohers." I like her.

I visited the magical city of Mdina, a medieval fortress with high stone walls, encircled by a green strip of grass where a moat once flowed. I took pictures in the various areas where the first season of Game of Thrones was filmed. The gate to the city is the same one that Catelyn Stark rides through to enter King’s Landing. Littlefinger’s brothel is actually a charming stone building with a vine-covered terrace hidden away in a corner of the city. Maybe I should have been more interested in the "real" history of the place, but I don't care, TV show history was good enough for me.

After Mdina, I explored the creepy maze of cobwebbed stone tunnels that is St. Paul's catacombs. I went down into maybe five of the more than twenty underground tombs before calling it quits. I was too scared a ghost was going to float through a dimly lit archway or pop up from one of the many excavated graves. So, I discovered I don't really like catacombs, but I did like the traditional Maltese dish I had for dinner - pasta with peas and rabbit in a creamy sauce, the perfect comfort food for calming your nerves post-catacombs.

By my third full day in Malta, I was really starting to get this whole carefree travel thing. The weather had been so nice my first two days, in the low seventies, a mix of sunshine and white puffy clouds, that on my last day I thought I might do some hiking and maybe even sit on a beach for a while. My optimism was such that I wore my swimsuit under my clothes as I set out early in the morning to catch a ferry to the small island of Gozo, one of three islands that make up the republic of Malta. My hubris was immediately rewarded by grey foreboding skies and the promise of rain, but that’s ok, because traveling means flexibility. I changed my plans from beach to citadel.

I had just entered the gates of the citadel of Rabat when the downpour began.

Here’s a fun fact that I didn’t know before: If you’re in an ancient stone city and it starts to downpour, every narrow street instantly becomes a rushing torrent of water. Everywhere you turn is like an ancient stone Slip ‘N Slide. No matter, I thought, this is traveling! I was able to duck into a restaurant and wait out the storm with some homemade ravioli and fresh Maltese bread. (Perk of solo travel: Always having the bread basket completely to myself).

My lunch spot where I was soon joined by other travelers trying to avoid being washed away through the narrow streets.

I spent the rest of my day on Gozo riding the double decker hop on/hop off bus (like a proper tourist) through the countryside, stopping in tiny villages, each built around beautiful stone churches. I hopped off at the Ggantija Temples, built around 3600 to 3200 BC, so named because legend had it that they were built by giants. Makes sense. How else could ancient peoples have moved such massive boulders?

I ambled back to the center of the village and ordered a piece of chocolate cake and an espresso at a cafe across from an elaborate 17th century church (no big deal, all the villages have them) and waited for the next bus. Then I realized I had missed the next bus. I took another bite of my cake and figured I’d catch the next, next bus, and that would be fine. I had already accomplished my one goal of enjoying myself. There was nowhere else I needed to be.

The next day I got on a plane headed back to Bulgaria, back to finish out the rest of my "write a memoir" part of my overly ambitious To Do list, and I realized how much I had actually accomplished on this trip without realizing. I hadn't tried to form each day into a witty blog post (I had no intention of writing this, nor is it that witty), but I had journaled everyday just for the fun of it. I didn't run five miles, but I always surpassed 10,000 steps for the day just from my happy wanderings. I hadn't flossed at all, but who gives a crap. I didn't gain a profound understanding of God, but I had felt the awe of being in sacred spaces, in ostentatious cathedrals, small village churches, and ancient temples.

I left Malta with a sense of wonder at the many ways that humans have lived, worshipped, survived, battled, and thrived throughout our vibrant history. I left revived by the salty breeze and blue sea. I left unashamed to put mayonnaise on my french fries. I left with the reminder that I really, really like this whole travel thing and that I’m allowed to scrap the To Do list and enjoy it sometimes.