Author Archives: Antoine Cassar

Radju Ottu 88.8 – from Bonnevoie to Ithaca

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Una piccola e sporca odissea. After a month of painful driving down France and Italy, I found a home in Santa Cesarea. Then I set out towards Haifa and Jerusalem, following St Michael’s ley line, to do something for my family. I crossed the Ionio… but didn’t make much headway. On my fourth day in Greece, hyperacusis took over my life.

Ursula must resign

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URSULA MUST RESIGN
Two open letters, a concertino all’alba, and a reply to the EC “ethics committee”

In early August, from Hotel Europa, Via Malta, San Bartolomeo, I sent an open letter video, with Don Pablo the cat, to Ursula von der Leyen, asking her to resign as president of the European Commission, for three major reasons.

As she did not resign by 1st September, I tried to resign myself, yet HR told me I cannot, due to a disciplinary proceeding against me. I thus recorded a second open letter, outside Hotel Mediterraneo, Santa Cesarea, to explain that when my sick leave is over (long story), I will have no choice but to strike.

A few hours later, at dawn on the cliffs of Torre Miggiano, I recorded a third video, in which I play toy piano to Ursula, and to other ‘padroncini del mondo’ and their political puppets. Now, finally, the EC “ethics committee” have got in touch, with long-winded documents I cannot read, and an invitation to a videoconference hearing on 12th October. My back, my shoulders, my ears hurt too much to read the screen and type for long. I sent an audio recording instead. I have no fear of the consequences, and much less of the system, the higher echelons of the capitalist pyramid, the military-industrial complex that placed Ursula at the helm of the European Commission last November.

As a teenager in a violent boarding school in England, I used to look at the EU flag and feel warmth in the stomach, knowing that there is a better possibility than monoculture, nationalism, xenophobia, violence. Today I cannot look at the EU flag anymore. I no longer see stars, but a barbed wire ring, and a crown of thorns.

Below are the two open letters, the concertino all’alba, and my audio response to the “ethics committee”. The disciplinary proceeding should be against Ursula, not me, as she is the one going against the interests of the European Union, its citizens and villagers, the “neighbourhood”, and beyond.

Pablito, DJ Ottu and I will be fine. The lion will defeat the bear. But first, we need to rest our ears and voice, on an island (don’t know which one yet), and train. I might be going deaf, like my Nannu Frank, a Maltese refugee in France. Since the third day of lockdown in mid-March, noise hurts me deep inside, and it is becoming unbearable, even with earplugs. If I will slowly go deaf, so be it. I can stop talking, and write.