This weekend, we experienced a slice of another important tradition in Malta, carnival. Similar to what one might experience in other Catholic regions of the world, carnival is a series of parades with floats, music, costumes, food, and general revelry. It begins on the Friday prior to Ash Wednesday (the start of Lent), and ends on Fat Tuesday, or Shrove Tuesday. In Malta,  carnival happens in two major locations, Valletta and Gozo. We headed to Valletta on Saturday afternoon, and saw some of those fancy floats we had heard about. We also saw lots of costumed kids—some costumes looked like traditional Knights of St John getups, but many were closer to Halloween costumes. Probably the most fun was running around with other Maltese kids, chasing bubbles.

For the first time on our trip, we met some Maltese children. Their father, Emanuel, is one of our close contacts at the University of Malta, and his kids are ages 8, 6 and 4. It was quite amazing to see just how much they share, culturally—I wouldn’t have expected this, but the 8 year-old knew a lot of the same characters, books and dance moves as Keegan. We hope to have some more play dates with them this spring.

Finally, we had our first game night with the students on Monday. We played several rounds of “Hedbanz,” one of our family’s favorites, along with a game that is reminiscent of another of our standbys, “Famous People.” The rivalry was pretty fierce, and I hope we didn’t annoy the neighbors too much with our hooting and howling.

Julia (6), Kyle, Keegan and Amy (8) order pizza

Game night!

A float especially made for Percy Jackson fans

Gelato in the shape of a flower!