Johnny Cigarini

by John Cigarini

  The pelicans are the most plentiful bird. I see half a dozen of them diving into the water for fish right in front of my house, all day, every day. I think the rocks in front of me are a good source of small fish; the panga fishermen also go there to collect their baitfish in the early mornings. The pelicans are lovely to watch while they are flying in formation. The gringos call it the Mexican Air Force. They either fly in a V formation of up to thirty birds, or in one long line, and ride the waves. They skim the front of a breaking wave, inches from the water, riding the air thermal caused by the wave. The birds take it in turn to flap their wings, those behind riding the slipstream of the bird that’s flapping. Pelicans apparently dive into the water with their eyes open to catch fish. Consequently they get cataracts and can go blind, and then starve to death because they can no longer fish. You sometimes see an elderly pelican sitting forlornly on the beach, waiting for its time to become a meal for the turkey vultures.

  One bird I see each day is the magnificent frigatebird, and I can usually see a dozen. They have beautiful Z-shaped wings and use them to fly very high, sometimes up to 2500 metres, and soar in the thermals and then descend to near sea surface. They spend days and nights on the wing and never enter the water to catch fish; they catch jumping fish or scraps left by larger fish. They sometimes attack other seabirds and make them disgorge their meal in flight. They were sometimes previously known as the man-o-war or man-of-war, due to their rakish lines and aerial piracy of other birds. They rarely seem to land; I have never seen one on the ground, but I wish to. I hear the males have a scarlet throat pouch that inflates like a balloon in the breeding season.

  I have two ravens that seem to have adopted my house. They love to sit on the lighthouse tower. They come each morning and sometimes wake me with their clucking and calling. They are larger than a crow, with long beaks, and they are always in a pair. Ravens have coexisted with humans for thousands of years, and due to their ability to solve problems, they have always been considered highly intelligent. In some cultures, including those of ancient Ireland and Wales, they have been revered as a spiritual figure or god. They can live up to twenty-one years, which is much longer than most birds. I don’t think the number twenty-one is coincidence – in numerology, it is a power number and the number of the great spiritual masters of humanity. In Greek mythology, ravens are associated with Apollo and are considered good luck, and were God’s messengers in the mortal world. In Middle Earth, the ravens of Erebor brought secret news to the people of Thrór. Tolkien had them capable of speech in Ravenhill. I wouldn’t rule anything out; they are secretive, and wise ones of the skies.

  In addition to the large birds, there are also wonderful small and mid-sized birds. I have a cactus wren, which visits me a few times every day. It sits on a tree in my patio, singing away. I think it must have a nest in my garden. Then there is the woodpecker, which also likes to sit on the cacti. The yellow and black orioles are daily visitors, and the wonderful bright red cardinal birds are more rare, maybe only a once-a-month sighting. Only the male bird is bright red, and he has a crest. Because of the red crest, which is reminiscent of a Catholic cardinal’s mitre, the colonialists named them cardinals. I had a real thrill one day when I had five red male cardinal visitors eating the berries off one of my bushes, all at once – as you’re in luck to see just one. The people who live in the back get more of these colourful smaller birds; there is more vegetation than on the coast where I live. I get more of the big birds such as the turkey vultures and pelicans. There are many other varieties of birds on the beach, like gulls, sandpipers, terns, cormorants, egrets, and the occasional grey heron. In the garden, I also have quail, doves and hummingbirds. We have beautiful butterflies and moths, too – including a plentiful one about six inches long, which we call the bat moth.

  *

  The sea in front of the house is the Sea of Cortez. That is the Mexican name, but the Americans call it the Gulf of California. The ancient Spanish name was the Vermilion Sea, as it is called on the old sixteenth-century maps. The reason is we sometimes get wonderful reflected sunsets over the Sea of Cortez, which in turn makes the sea turn red. Hence, the name Vermilion Sea.

  Although my view of the sea faces east, I am on the Cape, so I also face south into the Pacific. I have a 200-degree view of the sea from my house. There is no land between me and Antarctica and New Zealand, none at all. That’s why there are occasional big waves that the surfers love. It is mainly a summer thing, when I am not here, but when there is a southern hemisphere winter storm in the Pacific, the surf here is huge. Shipwrecks Bay, just a mile from my house, is an internationally well-known surf break. The waves have travelled an enormous distance when they reach us. Fortunately, during the northern hemisphere winter, when I am in Baja, the water is calm and I can swim in front of my house on most days. But I have to be careful; the big waves can catch one unawares. On the Pacific side of the peninsula, you cannot swim unless you are a surfer. People drown over there. A few years ago, and again recently, an elderly couple were taken by a rogue wave while walking down the beach. If people drown in the Pacific, due to the currents, their bodies are rarely recovered. Chances are they end up in Hawaii. Not a bad place to rest, I guess.

  The Tropic of Cancer runs near to La Paz, a three-hour drive north. John Steinbeck, in his The Log from the Sea of Cortez, says that California was named after the arch and beach at Cabo San Lucas. The United States bought US California, along with Arizona, New Mexico, Nevada and Utah, an area known as the Mexican Cession, for $15 million in the Treaty of Guadeloupe Hidalgo in 1848 (just after the Mexican-American war over the Alamo) – not really that long ago if you think about it, in the lifetime of my paternal grandfather.

  The Mexican Cession area had been called Alta (Higher) California, to distinguish itself from Baja (Lower) California. After the Treaty, the US took the name California for its Western State, and Mexico retained the name Baja California. When the transfer of the Mexican Cession took place, the few residents of Baja appealed to be allowed to become part of the British Empire, but they were refused and Mexico retained control of the remote region. In those days, the whole area, including Alta California, was desert. It’s still like that down in the East Cape; it is like Santa Monica and Malibu were 100 years ago. Just a few houses dotted along the coast, with nothing but desert forest behind.

  There is British history in Los Cabos. There are still old Mexican Baja families with British names, like Green. Trade with Ming China through Manila was a major source of income for the Spanish Empire. The Spanish Manila Galleons, carrying treasure from the Spanish Philippines back to Spain, would head east from the Philippines, because passage around the Cape of Good Hope in Africa was reserved by Treaty for the Portuguese. The galleons would cross the Pacific on the trade winds until they reached Alta California, the present day California. They would then navigate down the Pacific coast of North America until they got to the arch at Cabo San Lucas, and then go around the arch to get to mainland Mexico. The arch was an important marker for the galleons. It really is the southern tip of North America. The galleons would stop off in San José del Cabo, to get fresh water from the San José River. They would eventually offload the treasure at Acapulco, and mules would carry it across Mexico to Veracruz, on the Gulf of Mexico, from where it could be shipped across the Atlantic Ocean to Spain. That’s if they made it to Acapulco. British privateers and pirates, such as Thomas Cavendish, Captain Morgan and Sir Francis Drake, would lie in wait for them around the capes of Baja California – the area now called Los Cabos, meaning the Capes. Drake was a hero in England, but in Spain was considered little more than a pirate. The only difference between a pirate and a privateer was that the privateers were sanctioned by the Queen and shared their booty with her; the pirates, however, were outside the law and looted it all for themselves.

  La Fortuna is one mile from where I live. It is an arroyo, which means river valley, and is about fifty metres wide. Arroyos are usually dry, the
water only running when it rains, which is once or twice a year. Where this arroyo meets the beach, there are three ranches containing Mexican families, who have lived on the land for generations with ancient rights. The rancheros are the only Mexicans living out on the coast of the East Cape. Some of the ranchers have cattle and goats, but many of them now live doing construction work or other jobs for the gringos.

  When Thomas Cavendish, the English privateer, captured his richest prize, the 600-ton sailing ship and Manila Galleon Santa Ana, in Cabo San Lucas, for which Queen Elizabeth I knighted him, he was said to have buried some of the treasure at La Fortuna – hence the name. My neighbour Mark Faulconer and I will go out there one day with metal detectors to look for it. I suppose that will be the final and ultimate test of my golden bollocks. I had a Cavendish connection while living at Ridge. Sophie Cavendish, daughter of the late Duke of Devonshire and sister of the present duke, whose family goes back to Thomas Cavendish’s ancestor Roger Cavendish, was my neighbour. She was the first wife of Alastair Morrison, later to become Lord Margadale, the owner of the Fonthill Estate, where I lived. Sophie’s cousin, Bridget Jones film producer Jonathan Cavendish, was also my neighbour.

  *

  In Baja, I live fifteen miles from the small Spanish colonial town of San José del Cabo. We have no hotels on the East Cape and only one road, and that is just what we want. The people who winter here love the tranquility and the undeveloped nature of the East Cape, but some visitors can’t handle it. I do believe it takes some adapting to. Perhaps we are so used to busy lives that when we’re hit with tranquility and the sounds of the natural world, we freak out. The first time I came here, I found the place by accident. I was staying in Cabo San Lucas and I drove out to the East Cape looking for my friend Roberta Booth and her dome home. I missed my turn and drove another five miles up the coast to the La Fortuna ranch, one mile past the house I would end up moving to. I remember thinking that only a madman would live out here. Now, I do.

  *

  The people of Baja are the crème de la crème. True beauts and I am proud to know them and call them my dear friends, of course… in no particular order, like my agnostic Jewish guru Percy Hendler and his wonderful wife Estela. Percy and I go on our quad bikes up the beach to visit the fishermen two miles away and buy huachenango, the red snapper. We are eating it within three hours of it coming ashore. There is my old chum Roberta Booth, the wonderful Dennis and Gun Bush, the Phillips family, Jenny Armit from the beautiful Hotelito in Todos Santos, my neighbours Pete and Donna, and Dan and Erika Byrne, Rick and Brenda Johnson, Mark Faulconer, Peter Mock, Jeff (the best fisherman on the coast), Pier and Norma Azcona, Diana and Studie (the Vietnam War vet and wild man of the East Cape), Howard and Maciek – or DJ Magic, as he is known, the organiser of the full moon parties. They take place deep in a dry arroyo (river bed) and you’ve just got to see these arroyos to appreciate how beautiful nature can be: fig trees, palo blanco and cardon cactuses growing out of the rock walls, usually with their roots showing. When I go, it’s only with friends… and it’s perfect.

  A few years ago, Maciek, the organiser of the full moon parties, got hit by a car as he was walking across the slip road to the main highway. He was unconscious in hospital in San José with a broken pelvis. His friend Kirby Brown was called, because her number was on his cell phone. She moved him from the public hospital to a private clinic, called me up and I went down. Maciek had no medical insurance, but had lived in Calgary, Canada fifteen years earlier. I had to act fast and act I did. I went into producer mode and it was as if all my training had been about this very moment. Funny how life works; it was just like being back at the office, setting up a production. For two days solid, I was on the phone, negotiating to get Maciek treatment. I spoke many times with the hospital in Calgary and with the surgeon, pleading with them to take him, and with the Canadian Consulate in Cabo San Lucas. In the end, I got the hospital in Calgary to agree to take him, at which point the air ambulance agreed and came. We did it, thank God, but Kirby Brown was not so lucky. She was one of the people killed in the New Age sweat lodge tragedy in Sedona, Arizona, organised by the self-help guru James Arthur Ray. He was jailed for two years.

  Mose Mosley likes to call himself the executive producer of the East Cape. He arranges the Shipwrecks Film Society’s Cinema in the Sand. Mose has built a giant wooden screen where he shows up-to-date films. He told me about his plans before he started Cinema in the Sand. Being a typically cynical Brit, I told him it was a terrible idea and no one would show up, but about eighty people now attend, drink margaritas and eat popcorn. Ah well, I guess in the words of the great Hollywood scriptwriter William Goldman, “Nobody knows anything.” In between, Mose makes short films about the East Cape, which get a few hits on YouTube, including a funny one you can find under the title ‘Cinema in the Sand’. I am featured with my sexy inflatable bonking sheep, Baaarbara.

  *

  We have no shops or amenities out on the East Cape, and had no restaurants or bars until Zacs opened up in Zacatitos – thanks to Angel and Paul. Another has arrived, by Fano, Maria and Pedro at La Fortuna. We all hope they will do well, as it is much nearer than Zacs, and now that I am seventy… yards count! Pedro’s usual job is to drive along the beach on a quad bike in the middle of the night, looking for turtle tracks. He retrieves the eggs and puts them somewhere fenced off from dogs, as they will dig them up if they are left on the beach. Sometimes, we see baby turtles hatching. The magic never stops.

  *

  I used to visit my friend from London, Kelly Ann Page, in Oaxaca, which is in the south of Mexico. She used to winter there in my favourite Mexican town. I stayed in a wonderful sixteenth-century former monastery, the Camino Real Hotel, and one night I counted six different types of music being played around the town. There are fantastic Mayan ruins nearby at Monte Albán. Kelly Ann and I also went together to the silver town of Taxco, and to Mexico City to see all the Diego Rivera murals. I wrote to tell her I was doing an autobiography and she replied:

  Oh… that’s good. Hope you will write the truth… that I ws the best shag you ever had not to mention the perfect tour guide

  besos,

  kellita

  if you write that I will confirm that you have the largest most perfect penus i ever experienced

  xxxxxxxxx

  It seems like a good trade-off and a nice way to begin ending this book.

  Chapter 39

  What’s in a Name?

  There is only one John Cigarini. Cigarini is a very rare name, even in Italy. Many years ago, my eldest sister Maria did a cheap genealogical search and traced the family name back to patriarchs from Venice in the 1400s. There has always been talk in my family that a title, Conte di Nuova Modena, was sold by one of my father’s brothers to a French family in the 1940s or ’50s.

  I go by many names. John Cigarini was my working name, although John is my least favourite. Many people just call me by my surname, Cigarini. Chigalini was practically the first word ever spoken by one toddler I knew.

  Johnny is my family name and is used by my sisters, all the villagers in San Leo Bastia, many of my friends in Baja California, Glynis Johns, and older friends such as Maryam d’Abo and Roger Waters. Johnny Chig is a common variation.

  Isaac Tigrett, the adorable Susie Roberson, Siobhan Barron and my nephew Luca Rebecchini all call me Johnny-Boy! But for Joanna Jacobs, it’s Johnny Baby.

  Caro Ritchie calls me Baja Johnny, or Johnny Baja. In Baja, a few people call me Lighthouse John. Or English John. It differentiates me from Goat Hill John.

  Chiggers is my preferred nickname, in spite of meaning a flea in the USA. Jim Powrie, Neil and David, in fact most of the Umbrian expat crowd and Eric Clapton use it.

  Victor Lownes and lots of friends like Carol Adler, Mary Heale and Jill Powrie keep it to just Chig. Michele and Terry Gross call me The Chig. Liz and Mike Dalling call me Chigs. Other people such as Josh Ritchie call me Chiggy, but Ross Cramer used to call me
Chiggy-Poo.

  Steve O’Rourke, Dany Holbrook, John ‘Butch’ Stephen, Johnny Gaydon, Legh ‘Leapie’ Davies and the others of the 1970s King’s Road crowd all called me Cigar – which is funny, because I have never had a cigar, or even a single cigarette, in my life.

  Rupert Keegan used to call me Pigarini, when I had the pig valve, and even when I no longer had it.

  Ronnie Holbrook used to call me Shangri-Lani, and Golden Bollocks Cigarini – both with the same message, lucky bastard. He also called me JC, as does Roberta Booth.

  Nike Williams, former fashion editor of Honey magazine, who I still see in the Chelsea Arts Club, calls me Fingerelli, or Fingers for short. My fingers have never been near her – it just sounds Italian.

  The lovely Emerald Armit calls me Uncle Pete.

  The gorgeous young ladies Georgina Powrie and Becki Trembath call me Dirty Uncle Johnny.

  Rob House calls me Chigolo.

  At Durham University, they didn’t have much to go on with Davies, so I was sometimes called Smiley.

  I still like Johnny Margate; my friends Corinna Liddell-Gordon and Gerry Howarth call me that.

  My nephews in Italy call me Zio Grande Stronzo. Aka, Uncle Big Shit.

  I once had a collection of misspelled envelopes; I must have had about 20 or 30. I was going to make a montage of them, but I never got around to it and eventually threw them away. There were lots of names beginning with Sh. I remember some in particular: John Shaggerini, Johnie Jiggerini and Mr G. Karini.