QUEER MEDITERRANEAN MEMORIES - PHOTOGRAPH GALLERY

These photographs may not be reproduced

from this website

without the written permission of Joseph Carmel Chetcuti.

(Above) Two men holding hands?

The photograph is believed to be at least 100 years old.

(Above) Off to Carnival (circa 1937).

(Above) "Queen of the queens"! Bobbie Papagiorcopulo, a brilliant pianist and Malta's leading Strait Street female impersonator.

(Above) The Siver Horse in Strait Street, one of Bobbie's haunts.

(Above) The Mascot Bar in Strait Street, home to Stella and Nena.

(Above) Dirty Dicks in Strait Street, a bar with no women.

(Above) Bormla's Il-Golliwog (Charlie Willie Camilleri).

(Above) Il-Golliwog (Charlie Willie Camilleri) with Cookie (Karmenu Preca) at the Klondyke (Floriana, Malta), circa 1950s.

(Above) "Unidentified female impersonator".

(Above) Another "unidentified female impersonator".

(Above) Sailors in Malta (possibly 1950s). Sailors in love?

(Above) Fiorella strutting her stuff at one of the Miss Banda beauty pageants.

(Above) The cooks' quarters adjacent to the Hotel Phoenicia, the site of the first Miss Banda. Here also, Miss Easter extended the season's greetings to friends and patrons, wearing nothing but a bow around "her" scrotum ('like so!').

(Above) Valletta's Lantern Bar, the watering hole of the Wembley Store Boys.

(Above) Rabat's The Camp's, a favourite watering hole for guests at "mock weddings".

(Above) The author presenting Il-Ktieb Roza

to then Labour Prime Minister Dr Alfred Sant (1997).

(Above) The author with former Minister Evarist Bartolo and Dr Emy Bezzina at the launch of Il-Ktieb Roza (1997) on "Il-Parlament tal-poplu" (Live FM).

(Above) The author presenting Il-Ktieb Roza (1997) to Ms Miriam Spiteri Debono, then Speaker of the Maltese parliament.

No photographs of the author presenting the book, Il-Ktieb Roza, to the then President of Malta, His Excellency Dr Ugo Mifsud Bonnici, and the then Opposition Leader, the Honourable Dr Eddie Fenech Adami, are included on this website. Disappointingly both the Palace and the Office of the then Leader of the Opposition appear to have refused the author's request for a photographer to attend the presentation of the book. A photographer who was at the Palace was told that the presentation of the book was not a formal occasion. Yet on 23 March 1997, on page 33, The Sunday Times had a write-up of a Dr Francis Cachia presenting "a copy of his latest book" to the then President of Malta. Further details concerning this matter are available in the Alternattiva edition of 21 August 1997, on page 5, and in the Letters to the Editor section of In-Nazzjon of Wednesday 20 August 1997.