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10 maltatoday | SUNDAY • 11 SEPTEMBER 2022 NEWS IT was halfway through an in- formal conversation over lunch at Castille that Queen Elizabeth II had asked to visit Villa Guar- damangia. The year was 2005 and Malta was hosting the Commonwealth meeting, known as CHOGM. The request was dropped during con- versation with then prime minis- ter Lawrence Gonzi. The Queen had expressed a wish to visit the house which served as her resi- dence between 1949 and 1951. Gonzi recalls that moment vividly when speaking to Mal- taToday on his recollections of Queen Elizabeth, who died on Thursday, aged 96, ending a 70-year-long reign. The former prime minister says his protocol team panicked because the villa was in a bad state of repair. "I was impressed by the Queen's detailed recollection of the first years of her married life which she and her husband had spent in Malta. Evidently, she had found the time to explore Malta driving through our towns and villages, familiarising herself with our Maltese character and way of life," Gonzi recounts of that conversation over lunch. "On that occasion she ex- pressed her wish to visit villa Guardamangia – the place of her residence during those obvious- ly happy days. This was a request that was greeted with some pan- ic by my protocol people be- cause of the villa's very bad state of repair. As a result, we had to politely explain that it would be best to postpone this for a future visit." The Queen lived in Villa Guar- damangia for periods between 1949 and 1951 while her hus- band Prince Philip was stationed on Malta as a Royal Navy officer, making the Pietà home the only house outside the UK in which a British monarch has resided. Indeed, the monarch report- edly "spent her happiest years a carefree princess" in Malta, making the most of her freedom before committing to her duties as queen. The villa was acquired by the Maltese government and en- trusted to Heritage Malta in June 2020 to be restored and enjoyed by the public. Joseph Zammit Tabona, who served as Malta's High Commis- sioner to the UK between 2009 and 2013, has his own sentimen- tal anecdotes with the Queen. When Zammit Tabona first handed his letter of credence to the Queen, she recalled that she would receive a basket of Mal- tese oranges every Christmas from Mabel Strickland. Zammit Tabona's wife Susan thought it would be a nice idea to keep up the tradition them- selves, and so every Christmas, the Zammit Tabonas would send their own basket of local oranges to the Queen. Beyond their own tradition, the Queen used to describe to Zammit Tabona her own time in Malta as a princess, when she would drive all over the island in her convertible car, "and not worry about security back then". Two years after the 2005 CHOGM meeting in Malta, the Queen paid a second visit, which Gonzi says highlighted her deep- ly emotional connection to the Maltese islands. "The year 2007 happened to be the 60th wedding anniversary Oranges for the Queen and how From Villa Guardamangia to a yearly appointment for Maltese oranges, Queen Elizabeth's ties to Malta were felt by many who met her over the years. Nicole Meilak reports The Queen and Prince Philip at the Presidential Palace in San Anton for the Commonwealth meeting in 2015