A refuge for migrants crossing the Mediterranean, Malta rediscovers its land-based identity while helping newcomers rebuild theirs.
Mario Gerada

Cliffs are a characteristic of the Maltese Islands. They have both cultural and ecological significance. They are also territories of life, of romance, and of tragedies and death. Photo: Maria Luisa Catrambone Liotta
.
How does one visualize the notion of territories of life when the stories one hears daily are about territories of death?
That haunting question is never far from the minds of those of us working with migrants in the island state of Malta in the Mediterranean. At the same time, reflecting on that concept raises deep issues about our own identity.
Located south of Sicily, east of Tunisia, Linosa, and Lampedusa, and north of Libya, Malta has a long history of colonization interwoven with a long struggle for sovereignty and self-determination. It became an independent country in September 1964, and the British troops and Royal Navy left in 1979, an event that is celebrated yearly as Freedom Day on March 31. The history of Malta is well documented; what is far less understood is how our history of colonization displaced our psyche and identity as a people.
How does one visualize the notion of “territories of life” when the stories one hears daily are about “territories of death”?
For most of us, London or Rome feels like our close neighbor, while we are entirely disconnected from the immediately surrounding cities, towns, and villages such as Modica, Linosa, Lampedusa, or Sousse. For the most part, Libya is now only mentioned in relation to stopping people from crossing irregularly by boat to seek asylum in Malta or Italy. This disconnect directly impacts the way Maltese people today (mis)construe their identities as people living on these beautiful islands. Many of us are searching for our genuine identities, away from belief systems built upon imported mythologies, seeking who we are, and where we are coming from, and mindful of our location, be it geographical, historical, or psychological.

Lampedusa, in the Mediterranean, holds significance beyond geography due to its role as a destination for migrants arriving by sea. Photo: Jeffrey Sciberras
.
Maltese, an ancient Semitic language written in Latin letters, whose roots are found in the Arabic language among others, has been an official language of the European Union (EU) since 2004 when Malta joined the EU. The influence of Latin languages is present as the colonizers came in waves, taking over the land and the people because of Malta’s geographically strategic position at the time. The gaze of the various colonial powers shaped the Maltese archipelago and its people. Small as it is, Malta used to be linguistically diverse, with dialects that encoded the names of endemic plants and animals that evolved here, adapting to often harsh climatic conditions. Over the years, however, many dialects were lost. English came to dominate as a de facto lingua franca, giving the Maltese an edge in today’s globalized world. Yet, the loss of biocultural diversity is our loss.

The purple flowers of wild thyme in the garigue. Thyme, Thymbra capitata (L.) Cav is called saghtar in Maltese, which originates from the Arabic za’atar, denoting a spice mixture. The garigue is called xagħri in Maltese, derived from the Arabic word for “desert.” Photo: Mark Anthony Falzon
.
“Territories of life” is a challenging concept for those of us working in the migration field, even more so when focusing on the intersection between biocultural diversity and conservation. Working with people on the move means working with people who are seeking asylum in a small country that is an EU member — people who arrive and narrate stories of war, torture, and violence, stories of deep historical, colonial, and intergenerational trauma. How can one reflect on territories of life from such a standpoint? How does one speak of stewardship in the case of territories that are at war and have become deadly, from where people are fleeing for their lives, leaving everything and everyone behind? Territories where the immediate response must be a ceasefire and a humanitarian intervention?
“Territories of life” is a challenging concept for those working in the migration field.
Life and death coexist on the land and in our hearts, leading us to reflect on the human condition of being confronted with both joy and tragedy while yearning for the fullness of one’s territory of life — a place where people shall make peace with one another and with all creation, renouncing violence. That place exists in our collective imagination — or is it in our memory? A place called Dilmun, Eden, Goloka, Atlantis, or Shambala.

Gateway to Europe. A memorial dedicated to the thousands of migrants who have died at sea trying to reach Italy. Photo: Jeffrey Sciberras
.
Malta began receiving migrants in 2002, mostly people crossing from Libya by boat to seek asylum here or elsewhere in the EU. We hosted refugees before, but since 2004 it has become a regular occurrence, with numbers reaching a few thousand per year. Over the last twenty years, the Maltese have hosted thousands of asylum seekers, first mostly from sub-Saharan Africa and later from the Middle East and North Africa. People from Somalia to Liberia, later from Syria and Libya, and more recently even from Ukraine have reached these islands in hopes of finding safety and a welcoming home. Many of those reaching Malta from Libya still manage to leave for mainland Europe, their actual destination.
Territories, be they land or sea, are neither entirely open nor fully neutral.
Borders, though, remain a hurdle for people on the move. Paradoxically, in a world dominated by neoliberal policies and open to the circulation of goods, capital, and services, borders remain closed for a majority of people. Point 2 of Article 13 of the Declaration of Human Rights says, “Everyone has the right to leave any country, including his own, and to return to his country.” And yet, territories, be they land or sea, are neither entirely open nor fully neutral. They are already inhabited by people, and newcomers often face challenges and hostility and sometimes violence. The question of sovereignty does come in. Landscapes are culturally storied. Cultures do clash, the dominant ones often oppressing minorities, keeping them under their talons as much as possible, oblivious to the origins of the word culture: the Latin colēre, to till the soil, to tend.

The sea and sunsets are significant for those of us living in Malta. The disconnect between ecological, rural, and urban spaces, however, is deep, even on such a small territory. Nature is becoming even more alien because of urbanization and gentrification. Photo: Maria Luisa Catrambone Liotta
.
For NGOs that carry out rescues of people at sea, establishing external sea borders at the cost of human lives is never in question. The Charter of Fundamental Rights should remain fundamental. In the last decade, however, we witnessed European nation-states prioritize the discourse on security to justify the militarization of “external borders” — a term that only makes sense if one reads the world from a Eurocentric perspective. The Mediterranean Sea has become the battleground between national governments and peoples, and the EU and its institutions play a key role in establishing external borders, moving away from the ancient idea of a shared sea, the Phoenician routes.
And what about the Maltese Islands themselves as Mediterranean territories of life? Are they still hospitable, or are they becoming unwelcoming, contradicting a Maltese identity we have built on the biblical description of the Maltese people as capable of “unusual kindness” in ancient times?
People on the move often tell stories of how their territories of life quickly changed into territories of death.
At school, we learned that Malta is at the center of the Mediterranean Sea. We learned about the important role our islands played in human civilization and history. All that changed at once as we turned into a border country to the EU, peripheral to this brave new world. Our role was reduced once more to one of military thugs, tasked with keeping boat people out, protecting the northern European countries from the invaders — a narrative we Maltese people are all too familiar with, ingrained as it is in our psyche. Our very own tiny country, which once dreamed of peace in the Mediterranean and the world and designed the first Education for Peace program for the UN, found itself cast as a border country once again in yet another battle within which human lives are sacrificed on the altars of power and war.
Sadly, the political discourse in Malta is no different from the one in the rest of Europe and has the same racialized, racist, and xenophobic elements. Detention centers have become policy, a way of “managing” irregular migration — an idea that was criticized at first but is now mainstream in Malta and throughout the EU. Indeed, Eden is a faraway place.

Asphodels near Pembroke in the northern region of Malta. In an island country increasingly cast as a bastion against invaders, Eden is far away. Photo: Mark Anthony Falzon
.
Those of us working in the field of migration, however, remember the names, the faces, and the life stories of those we meet and work with. The circumstances they found themselves in, their resilience, their incredible migratory and inner journeys. Their joie de vivre despite the traumas they experience and the losses they suffer. As we listen to their stories of war, death, torture, and devastation, we also hear their stories of survival, life, renewed hope, and new beginnings. It is a testament to the human spirit and heart—and that’s why we turned to a garden metaphor for our project. As Spanish philosopher María Zambrano says, “A garden is the architecture of the soul.”
Often, stories narrated by people on the move are also stories that are deeply grounded in ecological grief.
In 2013, we designed a project called Ħwawar u Fjuri (Herbs and Flowers). It was meant to shift the dominant narrative from one demanding that people on the move prove they deserve protection, even beyond the asylum process itself, to one focusing on their search for territories of life, honoring both their memories of life in the countries they lived in, but fled from, and their lived experience of Malta. Often, stories narrated by people on the move are also stories that are deeply grounded in ecological grief. Maltese people also narrate those stories, of the lost valleys, gardens, and joys that the natural landscapes of Malta used to freely provide. People on the move often tell stories of how their territories of life quickly changed into territories of death because of violent conflict or droughts, or both. As humans, we always need to maintain connections, even when we are on the run, seeking a safe destination.
During the project’s workshops, we spoke about landscapes in Malta that looked familiar to those who arrived here, sometimes without even knowing that the Maltese Islands existed. We exchanged stories about herbs that have a common cultural use or about missing ingredients, those that people can’t find on the Maltese Islands. Many are going to great lengths to import them, to recreate a sense of a cultural home here. We identified and explored biocultural links, especially through phonetics and semantics, such as noting that maraq in Somali refers to broth, whereas in Maltese meraq refers to juice, having the same Arabic word maraq at its root.

During the Ħwawar u Fjuri workshop, participants exchanged their recipes and delved into the etymology of plant names and their cultural significance. Photo: Andrew Rizzo
.
Through these workshops, we recreated a culture of hospitality and kindness, a space for encounter and storytelling. We found out that storytelling is a powerful cross-cultural tool for sharing and bonding. The focus on the traditional and cultural use of herbs and spices was central to these workshops as it remains central to people’s daily lives, especially for migrants living in a host country, negotiating identities and belonging. We learned new things about Malta as well, such as “ħall il-ward” (rose vinegar), an old remedy used by our grandmothers, also linked to a tradition in the town of Mosta where many women continue to lovingly cultivate “il-warda xandrija,” an ancient damask rose, known as “the rose of Malta” as it has long been cultivated here.
By sharing knowledge on the use of herbs and spices in one’s own culture, we facilitated the process for participants to adjust to their new territory while revisiting “culture shock” through a biocultural lens.
We found out that by sharing knowledge on the use of herbs and spices in one’s own culture, we facilitated the process for participants to adjust to their new territory while revisiting “culture shock” through a biocultural lens. Thanks to the use of herbs and spices and, when possible, gardening, diaspora communities are able to recreate a strong sense of belonging, of place and home, in their new hosting country.

A rose variety that has been cultivated in Malta for a long time and has been traditionally used in several ways, including to make rose vinegar. Photo: Jeffrey Sciberras
.

A poster from the Ħwawar u Fjuri project’s final exhibition, with a quote by a Somali workshop participant. Photo: Andrew Rizzo
One story told by a young Somali man who worked as a journalist touched our hearts profoundly. He narrated how, back in Somalia, he had gathered stories on the cultural use of herbs and spices there. This was his passion and the reason why he had joined the workshop. He told us how while crossing to Malta, the boat was caught up in a storm and they were scared that they would drown. In that moment of panic, people started throwing their belongings into the sea, and in his bag, which was thrown overboard, there was his notebook — all his research, which he hoped to publish, now lost at sea. Thankfully they survived, and this young journalist shared his story of survival with us. Perhaps, at the Ħwawar u Fjuri workshop he renewed his desire to work as an environmental journalist and ethnobotanist. We lost contact with him since the project. Hopefully, he is doing just that now.
“Flowers only grow in a peaceful place. They are like us human beings. War kills flowers.”
We heard another striking story also from Somali workshop participants. One woman who was in her late fifties met some Somali women in their early twenties. The elder Somali woman had memories of flowers growing in Mogadishu, whereas the younger Somali women had none of those memories. One of those young women said, “In Somalia, we never saw flowers. They only grow in a peaceful place. They are like us human beings. War kills flowers.”

Mandarins resting on the well in the Mdina’s Carmelite Cloistered Garden. It is the place where the Ħwawar u Fjuri workshops took place. Photo: Mario Gerada
.
A biocultural perspective and the notion of territories of life invite us to renew our hope for making peace possible.
In 2013 we dreamed and worked for a more peaceful and just world. Since then, we have never stopped working with people running away from violent conflicts, wars, or climate disasters. New wars started since then, displacing more and more people. Today, there are an estimated 110 to 183 ongoing armed conflicts and wars in the world. The figures are overwhelming, yet a biocultural perspective and the notion of territories of life invite us to renew our hope for making peace possible.
The Mediterranean region has an ancient biocultural and philosophical tradition of gardens and gardening. Within the small Mediterranean cloistered garden (a walled garden that, in both the Christian and the Muslim tradition, is a garden with water — a fountain or a well — as a central feature), one can find all the cosmology for peace we need today. Today, we are re-proposing the Mediterranean cloistered garden as a project for peace in the world. It is within the protected space of a walled garden that stories can be re-examined, re-storied, and re-told, knowing that peace can be attained only when humans collectively renounce violence and violent conflict. The garden is a symbol of that wisdom, the wisdom of the heart.
The garden is a symbol of the wisdom of the heart.
.
Support the Cause: Learn about N.a.di.r for Conservation and their ongoing monthly ethnobotanical workshops, and follow and contact Mario Gerada on Facebook: @Nadir for Conservation. Learn more about cloistered gardens in Malta at bit.ly/45nK5lB
Back to Vol. 13 | Read the Table of Contents | Like Our Stories? Please Donate!
Acknowledgments: The author would like to acknowledge the contribution of conservation biologist Simona Lippi, co-founder of N.a.di.r, for her support and insights in writing this story.

Photo: Adam Zurawiecki
.
Mario Gerada is a social worker passionate about biocultural diversity and ethnobotany. He works with migrants living in his native Malta. Mario designed the project Ħwawar u Fjuri, a space where Maltese and migrants can meet and get to know the “other” through stories about the cultural uses of herbs and flowers. Mario and Simona Lippi lead the small Maltese NGO N.a.di.r for Conservation.