The Squashed Man Who Married a Dragon

by Anthony Blackie

  ANDALUCIA

  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.

  MARLIN

  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.

  Marlin in Spain

  FUEGO

  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 ch
ina 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!

  A LITTLE DAYDREAMING………AFTER ALL THE TRAUMA.

  When the good San Miguel had worked it’s magic……in the briefest of moments, when it is possible to solve all problems, and see all things clearly……. it was then, that I thought…………. .

  I might have got an illicit girl friend. What I mean is somehow I have acquired a ‘confidant’ a gentle listening, sort of soul, with a mouth that must have been quite sensuous, when black and white television sets were new. To say she has the ‘hots’ for me might be putting it too strongly, but she seems ever so eager to please me. Tina cruelly described as Two Ton Tina works at ‘Cudeca’ the Spanish charity shop. Often in the second hand book section, which is where it all began.

  I read mostly biographies but nearly all the shelves, in all charity shops, are awash with novels. So we search together high and low, nothing is too much trouble for her. Down to the basement or up to the stock room, on missions of caring devotion she went, searching out any elusive biography just to please me. I had thought of following her, but its early days, I don’t want to rush things. What would I do if she cornered me in a dark recess, and held me in a power lock? pushing against me, with the might of a Welsh rugby scrum, best to play it cool for the moment.

  I have found myself visiting the Cudeca shop more often than usual and whilst ‘I don’t dance down the street on a chance that we’ll…….’ . I have definitely more zest for life. To hell with the risk, faint heart never……. but coming back home clutching a load of biographies that don’t normally feature on my radar, no matter how wide and varied my taste. And trying to explain to the “Evil one” why I had bought a copy of ‘Lino cutting and brass rubbings’ by Sidney Silverbottom, was worthy of an Oscar. Talking in my sleep would really nail me to the door, this romance could soon be doomed.

  So perhaps noticing a potential rival often loitering outside the shop, was a godsend. This huge and seriously heavy man, with Buccaneer type pantaloons that tie at the knee, his great calves the size of water melons. Perhaps this was the time for me to bow out, beaten but not to a pulp.

  I noticed on her exit Tina called him Harold, they joined hands and set off down the street together. I could tell immediately that they were tailor made for each other, even down to the matching shoulder tattoos. I can’t pretend that I wasn’t a little miffed. But the nightmare of being caught between the meaty great thighs of Tina or being flayed to death by Beloved, was no real choice even for a pensioner play-boy.

  Calling in at the shrine of San Miguel, where wisdom is handed down by the glass. I managed to get some direct insight to my battered feelings. I was pressurised by the swift passing of years, fast pouring down the hourglass of life. Ever eager for a kind word or friendly smile, I had dropped my guard, now all was clear……. en route for home……. at the Kiosk on the street corner, the woman who ran this enterprise…. looked a much safer attraction and in the soft half-light has a most appealing and gentle………

  Men in white coats………are coming again.

  BJORN AND INGA

  Bjorn and Inga are a couple of Swedish, sun seekers down in Andalucía for the summer months. We met this happy couple at a car rally, and Bjorn is an out and out MG enthusiast, an MG owner, and was delighted to find an MG engine in my Marlin. So off we went talking, like old friends, thankful that like most Swedes they speak very good English.

  They had rented a small house up the coast 30 miles away. Keen walkers and members of a local Northern European Walking Club, they asked us to join them on their next Tuesday mountain jaunt. ‘Upstairs in the mountains’ as Bjorn described it. So we had a great day led by a local guide – ‘upstairs in the mountains’ behind Nerja, followed by dinner out at a local restaurant, and so began our friendship, and enjoyment of their very good company.

  Bjorn had raced Minis for the British Leyland Team at some time in his early years and his love and knowledge of British cars, especially MG’s plus his mechanical knowledge left me in the shade. His mixed, odd English phrases like ‘we are meeting in the near
of the sea’ were a delight. One day down on the Balcon d’Europa at Nerja looking down over the small cove, I was able to impress the man. There were lots of cats down on the beach, probably twelve or so, all shapes and sizes, but one particular cat sitting on a rock stood out. ‘That one’, I pointed out ‘is a fine female cat’ ‘Oh yes’ he said. ‘Quite so’ said Inga, but they both wanted to know how I could possibly know it was female! Could I be certain?

  Now thanks to Stephen, a retired veterinary surgeon and a very good friend, together with Nick, the three of us, like the ‘Last of the Summer Wine’ have Monday adventures out in the untamed wilds and mountain tops, before seeking the sanctuary of a pub. When our walking trio was formed Stephen, who is particular who he walks with, issued me with a guiding rule. ‘Anthony’, he said, ‘No more kindergarten half pints and under no circumstances lager and lime. From now on…. pints of real ale…. in pint pots.’ The man was right, not only has my logic improved beyond measure but I have a clarity of vision I never had before.

  It’s here that Stephen and Nick with his staggering recall of facts, names and figures, tried to complete my education. This is a very uphill task for them, even if I concentrate! Nick can tell you, if you want to know, Mozart’s mother’s maiden name, who was the continuity girl when they made Gone with the Wind, and what key the Patagonian national anthem should be played in. With one tenth of these powers I could rule the world and Vicki too.