The Squashed Man Who Married a Dragon (9 page)

Standing in the Unicaja (bank), wondering why they have three customers access points when only one is in use. People are chattering away, like people do at any social event. Even the bowls of free boiled sweets had lost their attraction. Only I seem to become restless and a little agitated as the day slips away. A long-time expat I know joins the queue. I have a little moan to him about the lack of urgency. Well, he says, remember the attraction the Spanish laid-back relaxed ‘manana' life style had for you away from the rush and pressure of the UK, enjoy it!

I had come into the bank to draw out cash, for my three-man band of constructadors, pay for building materials plus some housekeeping for us. All Spanish banks close their doors for the day at 2pm. It's now just after 1.30pm., so my patience is wearing away. Suddenly the bank manager appears and closing the outside doors, he announces ‘We are out of money, all gone, no more left, finito.' This is like a pub with no beer! ‘OK', he said, ‘go and have a coffee and a cognac, come back at two thirty'. This we did without a murmur. On the dot we were back in time to see our man, coming up the street with a large white plastic bag of ‘spondoolies', confidence returned and life goes on.

Back in dear old Blighty, dodging the showers, I made my way to my bank, I say my bank because I opened my account sometime after the middle of the last century, but more importantly some of the staff know me well enough to greet me by name. That personal touch is everything in life. Newspaper bought, bank business done I return home, it was raining hard by now, and after parking my car I realized that I had left my umbrella at the bank. I decided not to drive back into town but to ring the bank to ask them to take care of my brolly until I could call in later in the week. A simple task you might think, I even had the branch telephone number, so far so good.

For some reason known only to those lofty few, who seek to improve our lot in life, I found myself speaking to a man in India. A very polite and eager to help, sort of chap. I tried to explain about leaving my umbrella in the bank. ‘Oh, no sir…first you must give me your full name and address.' This I did then tried to tell him about my umbrella…. ‘now I need your post code and date of birth…. . and contact phone number.'

I humoured him some more…but then…‘The third letter of your password, your mother's maiden name and your memorable date.' I had forgotten a lot of this a long time ago! Look, I explained, I only wanted my bank to………‘Yes, sir but we cannot do anything without the identification check.' I don't want to move money. Not even talk money, just my umbrella. ‘Of course, sir but the problems of money laundering are making the rules, now giving me the first two digits of your secret code number……' Men in white coats have appeared at the front door…. . they want me to go with them…. . I think I probably will.

The first beam of light that shines through our bedroom shutters, promises a day of warmth, pure air and a very clear light. The tiled floor is cool but not cold, I cross to the window, open those shutters. The sheer bright blue sky, and the golden sun shine is very nearly the guarantee of an everyday occurrence. This is perhaps the thing I like most about living in southern Spain.

Then having breakfast outside, feeling the sun warming me. Enjoying my pomegranate juice, toast and homemade marmalade and our English breakfast tea. While walking round the terrace, looking across the valley, hearing the crowing and clucking of distant poultry. Taking in the flowers, blossoms and smells of shrubs and trees, with the coming and going of insects, and the odd bee hard at work. There is no rush, almost no people, may be two or three cars in the space of the morning, just peace and quiet. Neighbours Miguel or Beatrice with mules will pass, we call out ‘buenas dias' to each other, this is our rush hour.

We don't squander every day, so morning spent gardening, broddeling about with something important, a break for coffee and a donut, then a little more of whatever I was doing until lunch time, a little after two o clock. Lunch outside, cold gazpacho, half an avocado and sea food or meat salad with all the fresh green veggies, peppers, onions, olives, potato salad, cheese and, of course, wonderful Spanish bread. An organic feast, aided by a cold San Miguel. Under the pretence of going to read or daydream, I seek out a shady spot, there on the recliner with its long cushioned mattress, is heaven. It is surprising how quickly my eye lids become too heavy, a Spanish siesta, for at least an hour, is an essential part of a long healthy life. Whatever you plan to do, paint the patio wall, mix cement to render or build a little something, or better still have a barbeque, it is not going to be rained off, or held to ransom by the north wind.

I get two days in one, right up till around nine-ish it's light enough to do anything. Then time to sit down, relaxing with a glass of good red wine, to shake off the pressures of the day.

Vicki slaves away in the kitchen, making Spanish dishes, patata pobre, fillet de cerdo, or it could be bangers and mash, fried onions and tasty gravy. Whatever it is, it's food for the Gods and me. Then she slips inside to watch TV and I refill my glass and dream in the warm Spanish, sub tropical evening. With so little light pollution, the stars and night sky is magical.

Some mornings we are up and about like people on a mission, within thirty five minutes or so, we can be down on the coast. Maybe we need a big hyper-market store to seek out the purchase of something special we cannot find in our local village. If we've set off early enough and the great Goddess smiles up on me, we can have Spanish breakfast in Velez Malaga. One of life's great pleasures is to sit outside, drink café con leche, watch the world go by, whilst eating tostada y aciete. This wonderful toasted Spanish crusty bread, brought to your table with a clove of garlic (if you wish) to be rubbed on the toast, then smother it in olive oil. Not to every Northern Europeans taste but for me I love it, oil running down my chin, every mouthful pure joy. Maybe a second cup of coffee or on high days and holidays a small copita of ‘cognac' and all for less than the cost of a Sunday newspaper!

Strolling up the streets of Velez-Malaga with oranges trees in blossom, I get a feeling that this is how life should be, even the angry buzz of motor bikes and scooters, who are the noise makers together with horns and exhausts are all Mediterranean background music, in keeping with the locals. Spaniards don't shout in the street, they are animated, happily greeting one another, laughing, talking away, words fired backwards and forwards. I can pick out the odd few, but for the most part they speak too fast for me to follow.

Often I have spoken to somebody who looked almost the image of a bandit from a cowboy picture, very dark brown, face creased with wrinkles, few teeth, old clothes and a battered hat, a look of studied evil! Then this charming man, with a warm smile and a kind and gentle disposition, if he can help me he probably will, taking the trouble to lead me to where I'm trying to find.

Bars are sometimes rather similar, the tired looking bar, ankle deep in litter, paper tissues, cig ends, etc., perhaps not too well lit and may be could do with a little redecorating, this is the one to choose. All points to the much used and most popular place with the locals, possible with the tastiest Tapas as well.

Driving round these great empty roads in Spain with almost cloudless skies, made the idea of one last sports car irresistible. May be a T R. or an M G., something like that would be ideal. We went to a sports car meeting in Malaga, to get a feel of things in Andalucía. After admiring some wonderful American cars of the 30's and 40's, totally restored to perfection by wealthy South American Hispanics – then on to all shapes and sizes of European cars. In the end we found ourselves talking to an enthusiastic ‘Brummie', an out and out kit car enthusiast. Derek's dark green low slung two-seater Marlin, wasn't the cleanest or the most polished car by a long way but it had a practical, purposeful sports car appeal. I had never considered a kit car except for the day dreams of A C. Cobra replicas with 5 litre V8 engines. This man spoke so much practical sense about galvanised chassis, bodies of fibre glass and aluminium rust free for ever, cheap spares always available from specialists and most of all instead of £12,000 – 15,000 sterling from £2,000 – 5,000 for a good road car.

The next point was a clincher – if the log book of the donor car showed it was at least 25 years old, then the finished rebuilt kit car would be eligible for the Spanish Classic Car Club membership and the special low insurance rate. Back in the UK I checked out all sorts of models, but the all round best seemed to be the Marlin, designed on the style of an early Alfa Romeo – plus the fact that it was originally made for speed trials then later for circuit racing. Strong, agile, comfortable, fitted with a 2 litre MGB engine, a light weight to power ratio makes for good performance. I found a very well finished car with lots of extras, and in bright Rosso red, a real head turner and a qualifying logbook; I drove it back to Spain.

We joined the Classic and Sports Car Club of Southern Spain and went on a number of rallies, met some very interesting people of all nationalities. Most of the events they called rallies were really fun runs, centred around lunch out somewhere, plenty of admiring and talking about the cars. Everyone got a T-shirt', a sticker, small presents and a presentation of the event certificate; no bruised egos or damaged cars.

One rally started in Malaga by Rosaleda, the football stadium, after an hour or so milling around and looking at everyone's cars, we were police escorted out of town at a stately 40 km.p.h. – no rush – to nearby Mijas, parked in a police cordoned off area and police guarded, whilst we had a long, leisurely lunch. We drove back to Malaga centre, and all through the city police were on duty at each traffic light and main junction to wave us through, other traffic and red lights over-ruled. Just like visiting ‘heads of state', a pure poseurs delight – applause and cheering by the ‘ordinary people'. I liked this and what was even more fantastic, the little red Marlin often attracted more attention and was more photographed than Ferraris and Jags or anything else. The side exhaust pipe made a gruff snarling bark. People waved, blew their horns in greetings, asked to pose with the car. The amount of interest and appreciation was unbelievable. Such was the good looks and rarity of the Marlin in Spain. The number of people who expressed the impulse to buy the car was legion. For me the other great feature was I didn't have to worry about using the car or scratching it – this was a pure fun car.

In the very early hours of this Spanish morning, I woke up, instantly knowing something was very wrong. In the dark, I couldn't see or hear anything, in an insidious almost gentle way, it hit me, quickly and hard. Smoke was here in the bedroom, smothering us both. I woke Vicki, in seconds she not only grasped the situation but knew the what and why.

One of Vicki's hobbies was miniatures, dolls house furniture and tiny china dolls. Vicki and Christine had jointly bought a modern steel kiln, put in clay moulded to the desired shape for heads, limbs, etc and then, after two or three hours of great heat and a very slow cooling down period, you have the white china parts. The room below our bedroom is the dining room, and off that our study/office and gloryhole with the electrical kiln.

Going downstairs into dense smoke with all the electricity dead, trying not to breath, we found the wooden study door. It was very hot to touch, but opening to assess the situation, flames roared into life, similar to a wild animal rearing up, fresh oxygen feeding the fire. Closing the door fast we made our way to the kitchen. Thoughts of ringing the fire service, not only were we seven kilometres out of town, in the campo but time spent finding phone numbers, a torch etc…was not an option. Neither would going to neighbours…which would lose us ten minutes or so, plus we were naked and going back upstairs to search for clothes in the smoke was not a good idea.

If the fire broke through the study door, then flames would be onto the seventeen wooden beams in the dining room, that held up our bedroom floor, enough fire fodder to leap up to the roof. Now was the time to fight the fire, whilst there was still a chance to save our home.

Looking back, one bit of luck, in the study was a wooden table, a couple of chairs, some clothes, bags, lots of paper, and assorted stuff that glory holes hold, but there were no wooden beams, the only room out of eleven of the entire house with only concrete beams. We filled buckets in the kitchen, took a deep breath, quickly through the dining room, opened the study door and threw the water in…and out fast. Sometimes you had to snatch a breath, then you realised the power and strength of smoke, it quickly closes you down. Instantly you know, that a few continuous breaths and under you go. Even many hours after lungs and chest feel the damage smoke can do.

We kept this up for about thirty minutes, until wet, blackened, eyes streaming, sore throats and tired out after the emergency energy burst, we had won! Surveying the damage after the fuego, apart from the sodden mess, and black sooty stains everywhere, there was remarkable little structural damage. The fire had been in a corner by the kiln, an electrical short, or fault, it had melted the wiring that had been tacked to the wall and ceiling, bottles of wine wrecked, and a ghetto blaster in the opposite corner, felt the heat and melted its handle.

The more serious damage was Vicki, in an effort to move some burning clothes, she managed to get melting manmade fibres wrapped round her ankles and feet. In the crisis she didn't notice until afterwards, these produced nasty burns. Otherwise we got off very lightly, from an incident that could have quite easily have ended in asphyxiation and being burnt to oblivion.

Spain is no more dangerous than England, I tell myself.

Yet another narrow escape of the fast, over in an instant, head clearing type occurred in a town called Osuna, an hour or so away. We went there to see rejoneadores. This is bull fighting from horseback, featuring the top three in the world. Whatever your feelings on bull fighting, there is no doubt about the stupendous and exciting horsemanship. The control and trust between man and horse, is beyond belief. The way the horses against all their natural fear, side step, pirouette, move inches away from the bull, with the horns sometimes lifting their tail, is incredible.

We had bought seats at the barrier, and Vicki had taken her video camera. The fifth bull entered the ring from opposite our seats, rushed at great speed to the centre of the ring, and then at an even faster rate straight across towards us. In seconds we knew it was not going to stop. It leapt into the air, splintering the top two planks of sturdy wooden barrier like Balsa wood. This only ten feet from us, it eventually landed in the ‘callojon', we were up on our feet frozen in fear. Vicki had the camera on and kept it on recording the whole episode.

The next day on Spanish TV we saw ourselves on film taken from the other side of the arena. It looked close then but we can tell you it was the closest thing, never again!