Malta is an iGaming island. Everyone works in iGaming, and those who don’t are the drifters on the wayside, the detritus that remains after the steel ship has ripped the land to little flakes and established itself as the new citadel from whence all the riches shall flow, henceforth.

They are affable though, these iGaming people. They pay well and treat their staff well. They give out menus to their new employees – even the Maltese ones. And the Scandinavians that run these companies – most of them will, inevitably, be Scandinavian – are not like the ‘bad’ foreigners that come here.

No, they’re not like the Africans who take our jobs, or the Eastern Europeans who cause trouble. No, they are affable and kind and – strikingly, unignorably – good-looking. The latter part is important. One of my (Maltese) friends said recently – half-mockingly, half-exasperatingly (for he was married) – that he is now working in an office with “five or six solid pieces of ass”.

They are trendy, too. The men with their hipster beards and the women as attractive as we’d just said. They are bohemians, but they’re clever bohemians. No slaving away in the shadows on obscure creative work for them.

Instead, they will funnel any impulse for creativity they have into promoting colourful, fun digital slot games. Games whose inspiration may come from any quarter of civilization. Hollywood or fairy tale. Myth, or history – inevitably, there’s a game about El Dorado, and the psychotic colonial leader Pizarro is interpreted as an endearing, bumbling cartoon fool.

The iGaming people know that they are engaging in an elaborate dance of money for all to see. Their hosts know it too. The euphemism of ‘gaming’ to say ‘gambling’ is the first trot, then come the colourful games – like we said – and then comes the increase in rent. Yes, the iGaming people can afford to come to Malta because it is their own El Dorado, and one with very little dangerous wildlife to machete through. Parking and traffic will be a problem, of course, but this is why we’ve created offices for them in the most sensitive, easily reachable places.

After the election – after nasty rumours spread by ‘traitors’ began to percolate – the Prime Minister himself paid a visit to the steel ship in the hopes of tamping down any fears about Malta’s uprightness and viability that the iGaming people may have had. The ramp from the steel ship descended, and the plump, ginger Prime Minister flashed a trademark smile that hid away and fear or hesitation. This was a man ready to do business, now as ever.

This was a man who could calm the choppiest of waters – or so his smile signaled. The hand that greeted him betrayed no such over affections and affectations, but what the people then saw was a photo opportunity that will warm their hearts and reassure them that, all will remain as it was. Normality will prevail. The rents will keep rising and construction will blot the land but apart from that, normality will prevail.

The picture showed the Prime Minister in the inner recess of the steel ship. This was a world onto its own. The citadel had, of course, its own trendy cafe. Brown walls and hanging lights and a bar whose white lick of paint appeared to be perpetually fresh, as if a crafty young employee – a marketing executive by profession, a carpenter by passion – would extricate himself from his desk every now and then and funnel his skills into ensuring the bar looks fresh and ‘genuine’ at every turn.

The Prime Minister is smiling, with a cup of tea or coffee in his right hand. He is looking to the left, not facing his interlocutor.

Not facing the leader of the iGaming people, into whose mothership he was just allowed. A man as young as our very own Prime Minister, but who – despite his Nordic provenance – does not have a ginger beard like our Prime Minister. The Prime Minister, who is not used to holding cups of tea or coffee with his fingers but who would prefer to clutch Styrofoam cups or large mugs and take long, generous glups.

But he’ll make an exception this once. As will we all.