It’s extremely hard to retain a positive attitude when you live in a town like Marsa. There is an overwhelming sense of dereliction and abandonment that make it feel more like a ghost town than anything else.

Small flocks of Marsin gather on Saturday mornings around the bar on Marsa Road, and at the Football Club, but any other day and Marsa is void. Going down to Menqa, the emptiness is felt even more greatly – the overall drabness of the place makes you shudder walking past. I don’t actually fancy modern architecture that much, and while I wouldn’t want that area to become a modernist haven full of wide empty walkways and sparse bushes,  a general cleanup of the place, a renovation of the already existing buildings would breathe new life into it.

At the moment it is the seediest, shadiest place on the island, known mostly for being the hangout spot of notorious bomb-planters, so a total turnaround is needed. Investors, businesses, NGOs, all should be given incentives for moving their ventures to that area, floodlights should be installed to reduce criminal activity, security cameras (as is the apparent plan) – it has SO MUCH potential.

We’re located at the very crux of the harbour, with a view stretching across Kordin, Isla, Birgu, and the Valletta shoreline. The view is incredible, but the area is deplorable. I hope that in my lifetime I manage to live in a Marsa which is safe to live in, bustling with activity and life, and valued for its archaeological significance. Then again, this is Malta, so…