Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/604914
maltatoday, SUNDAY, 22 NOVEMBER 2015 42 42 This Week The Aleppo Pine is a lovely, bright-green foliaged evergreen tree. It is popularly grown in gardens, afforestation areas and along roads. Despite its name, nobody brought it over from Syria: the species is quite native here. Before humans colonised Malta, Aleppo Pine (M. Żnuber) probably grew wild and thick in several parts of the islands, the summer air thick with its resinous fragrance. But people came along and chopped down all the woodland. No original wild pines remain today: the last possibly wild tree – a magnificent specimen at L-Imġiebaħ probably several hundred years old – was set on fire six years ago and destroyed. At our Foresta 2000 woodland regeneration project, several thousand young Aleppo Pines (some soon turning teenage now) are slowly but steadily growing. Many of them are already bearing cones and producing seed, which in a few places are themselves sprouting and growing. Yes, wild pines are growing again in Malta. With a little help from their friends. 481. ALEPPO PINE GREEN IDEA OF THE WEEK 384: : FIND OUT MORE AND REGISTER – WWW.FOEMALTA.ORG/LINKS/BEES Visit Friends of the Earth's website for more information about our work, as well as for information about how to join us. You can also support us by sending us a donation - www.foemalta.org/donate Text and photo Victor Falzon Salesians to stage social comedy ahead of Christmas season ATTURI Salesjani will be producing a so- cial comedy – Il-Milied Ta' Cupiello writ- ten by Eduardo DeFilippo and translated to Maltese by Louis Azzopardi on November 28 and 29 at the Salesian Theatre in Sliema. The success along the years of this comedy is primarily down to the author's unique way of describing unhappy things with a sad smile. Of presenting disappointment and pain through a veil of comedy. The fatherly figure represented by Luca, whose annual preparation of the nativity crib, is met with indifference by his wife Concetta and his son Tommasino. Domes- tic peace is broken by his daughter Ninuc- cia who tells her mother that she decided to leave her rich husband Nicolino for Vit- torio. The crib itself symbolises Luca's isolation, loneliness and will. For him it is a form of es- capism from reality of life, a way from learn- ing and confronting the truths. Each of the three acts represents a stage in Luca's exis- tential journey which is condensed in a few meaningful days during Christmas period. He holds tenaciously to the family ritual of the crib, typical of a Neapolitan family and serves as a refuge from his family's anxieties and troubles. Tickets are €10 and booking is available on line at www.ticketline.com.mt or at the booking office at the Salesian Theatre from November 24. Parking is free at the Salesian Grounds during performance dates Il-Milied ta' Cupiello, at the Salesian Theatre in Sliema on Saturday and Sunday