Walls and sea, that’s what I think of when I think of Valletta. Wherever you are in the city, you are never more than a few minutes from the sea, and always standing by bricks, usually mashrabiyas – windowed balconies that overlook the streets. It’s a city of repetition, the cobbled roads a grid system where narrow alleyways seem duplicated over and over. In a high-rise city it might be overwhelming, but on this small island, its endless sandy limestone buildings are all charm; its echoes an embrace of comfort. When you’ve lived years in coastal cities, surrounded by medieval and Arab architecture, it’s hard for Valletta not to feel like home.

I venture outside the capital to Mdina, endlessly warred over but now a mostly vehicle-free tourist spot, its fortifications render more walls, and its hilltop lookout offers sweeping views across the island, all the way to that persistent sea.

I was drawn to Malta for its history and language, the latter a descendent of Sicilian Arabic, all but preserved in time for ten centuries, which must be some kind of geographical and globalisation miracle. Perhaps ‘preserved in time’ is going a bit far – it has evolved with the influence of Latin languages – but it’s a unique experience to hear a sentences you can understand in a language you don’t speak. Arabic speakers aren’t accustomed to being able to decipher a sister language the way that Spanish and Italian (or French and Catalan, or Welsh and Breton) speakers can. So Maltese fascinated me, and so did its historical Arab rule, and the complex Maltese perception of its former British, Arab and French rulers.

Arab history is all but absent here, which wasn’t a surprise, but it was still a disappointment. While you have English post-boxes, telephone boxes, and pubs, all traces of its former Arab rule are intangible, in the language, and surnames, and even the existence of mashrabiyas in seemingly every city home. They have persisted despite their lack of acknowledgement, at odds with the threads of the British history in Malta that is celebrated today. Whether Arab history is something to lament or take pride in is for the Maltese to decide, I myself fall on the side of the preservation and education of history – a necessity for an informed, whole identity. At least that has been my experience.

But back to the walls. Beneath Valletta is a network of tunnels: cisterns and waterchannels that were knocked through to build air raid shelters during the second world war. Moist stalactites live side-by-side with primitive drawings of spitfires, Adolf Hitler, and The Virgin Mary. It’s curious, eerie, and chilling to explore, but I can’t help the uncomfortable feeling I start to develop when I see the industry created out of this sort-of British identity. Isn’t it odd to view your coloniser with such rosy-eyed wonder? In the gift shop, I browse the children’s colouring books chronicling on the history of Malta. The two hundred years when the Aghlabids ruled are completely absent.

I explore the ancient city of Rabat, visiting the Roman temple. I’m guided by a professor of history and local legend in his own right. We barely pass through a street without someone hailing him down or shaking his hand. It’s a bizarre but enjoyable experience being on the sidelines to his local fame. He tells that he’s pushing for British phone boxes to be taken down, wishes that they didn’t serve English breakfasts everywhere. People come here to experience Malta and Maltese food. When we spot a phone box that has been repurposed with a defibrillator, he snaps a photo, happy to see this symbol of the past being put to use rather than preserved simply for the glamour of being British. The Roman temple has a small section on the Aghlabid rule. He tells me it’s a new addition and is impressed that, slowly, Malta is beginning to acknowledge its Arab past. A Muslim cemetery was discovered on the site of the temple, and a grave has been relocated into the temple museum, casket ajar for all to see the bones. It’s no different to mummies displayed in museums across the world, but the sight of it makes me turn away. Of all the ways to recognise a history, these feels so undignified. I race through the rest of the temple, uninterested in the mosaic flooring, urns, amphorae and oil lamps. The quiet solemnity of it all.

The warmth of the city envelops me as I return to Valletta, grand wooden balconies, sandy walls turning gold late in the afternoon. The damp of the sea hanging in the air. The heat is uncomfortable, but the familiarity unmistakable. I suppose that’s probably what has me on edge. Language, weather, customs, it’s all so familiar, but, to Malta, for better or worse, I am not.