The Great Sultan

Fate is like a man who works in a kebab shop. As soon as he has stuffed the pitta to bursting point with meat, he leans over the counter and says: "chillie sauce, salad?" At least that´s how it struck me when after having a huge portion of fun I received my chopped cabbage and onion in the shape of two deaths in the family.

On Friday both Grandad Arthur (my last surviving grandparent) and Minnie Minx (a family dog) passed away.

My grandad had been suffering from dementia for some time and had already given up on life when grandma Winnie died several years ago. Losing his mind was always his greatest fear and he often used to say that he wouldn´t want to live like that. I never went to see him after he had slipped into an entirely helpless state, because I´m sure he´d like to be remembered how he was.

He was a wonderful grandfather, with an endless supply of magic tricks, poems and things to do on rainy days. He used to write us stories, often about a little fish called Willy Chubb, who had all sorts of adventures in a river near you. As he told the stories he would slip effortlessly between the different voices for Percy Pike, Eddy Eel, Terence Trout and all the others.

He was also a fantastic link to the past with tales of life in London in the early part of the last century. He told us about the cinemas, which were only silent on the screen. Huge gangs of excited children, him amongst them, would run riot in the stalls cheering and hooting at the adventures of Charlie Chaplin, Buster Keaton and all the others. He also remembered the first time he saw a car, and he painted a vivid picture of the sort of grinding poverty he worked so hard to escape - both for himself and his family.

His tale of how he met his wife, grandma, was also vivid - although the details tended to change slightly from time to time. The version I liked best culminated with him walking for miles through a midnight blitz, ignoring the shouts of the air-raid wardens and careless of the buildings exploding to his left and right. Above him searchlights skittered across the black sky, reflecting on the silver barrage balloons that bobbed about in the heavens, while death rained down on every side. When he arrived at his then girlfriend´s house he had to push past her garrulous mother, who never approved of their relationship, and ignore her insults as he fell down on one knee and proposed. All too often life was all too short then, so they married as soon as they could. They chose Christmas Day for their wedding, both to take advantage of the seasonal bombing truce and also to pool their extra rations for a decent buffet of spam fritters, marmite sandwiches and cakes made with powdered eggs and lemon curd.

He had a brilliant mind, and rose to lofty heights as a Freemason, largely due to his incredible ability to memorise endless tracts of the arcane rituals. I think he was often frustrated that he never had the opportunity to make better use of his brain at work. After his father died as a result of injuries picked up in the First World War he was forced to go out to work at the age of 14 to support his mother and brothers. During the Second World War he worked as an aircraft fitter and when peace came he entered the building trade, and played his part in reconstructing a battered nation.

Minnie, on the other hand, spent most of her life sitting on sofas and chasing rats. I think in dog years she was even older than grandad.

Anyway, back to the kebab meat that is the fantastic time I had in Leon. I spent a couple of days in the company of the Scottish-German sisters and their friend Emmanuel. We had a lot of laughs, and I particularly enjoyed a story Katherine, the younger sister, told about her childhood as a tomboy. She had a friend who also wanted to be a boy, so they would cycle around the neighbourhood pretending to be Benjamin and Stephan. But because Katherine´s parents had thoughtlessly bought her a pink bike, they had to rehearse a little scene to fool passers-by. Whenever they saw anybody the friend would call out: "Hey, Benny, why are you riding that pink bike today?" To which Katherine would reply: "Ach! Mine is at home and is broken, so I have had to borrow my little sister´s bike, which I don´t like because I am a boy and it is pink."

They moved on after a couple of days and I changed to a different hostel where I bumped into the two German girls (the actress and film producer, Lydia and Sarah) who I had met with the Belgian in Belize. There were also a couple of guys from Canada, one who was originally from Boston, USA, and the other whose family hailed from the Yorkshire Dales. Somehow, between the five of us, we remained in constant fits of laughter for the best part of three days.

Yesterday the party disbanded as Lydia, Sarah and I headed down to here - The Great Sultan, Granada. This town (yes, an even nicer colonial town on the shore of Lago de Nicaragua, central America´s biggest lake and the only place in world with freshwater sharks) owes its nickname to its Moorish namesake in Spain. It´s an absolutely lovely place. For further details the interested reader should refer to my descriptions of other colonial towns, adding adjectives such as very, incredibly, fantastically and overwhelmingly where appropriate.