Loose Neighbours

By Jim Gardner

due in the main; to the trials and tribulations related to a complicated divorce helen and joe decide to relocate. Spain is their choice of country and Marbella their choice of town. Unaware of the culture, politics, moral and social differences the buy an apartment within a small community. Initally all is good until they scatch the surface of life in a community only to discover that a multicultural exsistance is not what it seems and pretty soon they are embrioled in racism, jealousy, religion and crime at a level never before experienced

• Language: English
• Publisher: Jim Gardner
• Release date: Nov 10, 2016
• ISBN: 9781370522293

Jim Gardner

height5/9; weight 80k; balding i have no children. I have been in business for 20 yrs during which I have owned around six companies at one stage or another. These days I live with my long term partner.I Started to scribble around 15 yrs ago. To date I have written 4 books. 2 of the books have been as a ghost writer and the other 2 are about my ideas, observations and my views

Book preview

Loose Neighbours

By

James Gardner

SMASHWORDS EDITION

*****

PUBLISHED BY:

James Gardner on Smashwords

Loose Neighbours

Copyright © 2013 by James Gardner

This book is dedicated to those who stood beside us in the trenches

TABLE OF CONTENT

1Martin and Andrew

2Ben and Sharon

3Martin and Betty

4Miralda and Rashid

5Giovanni and Sandra

6Robert and Jane

7 Greta and Marco

8Ronda and Francisco

9 Mejia and Troy

10Karmala and Erica

11 Harrell and Julie

12Karl and Nina

13Pete and Petia

14Johan and Pam

15Volker and Conner

16Villy and Tina

17Ian and Malcolm

18Kitz and Terry

19Ken and Sandy

20Helen and Joe

Chapter 1

Martin /Andrew

Helen and I first met on a Glasgow building site in the spring of 1990. I was the owner of said development and she the advertising rep of the National newspaper. I’d asked my secretary to call the relevant department and arrange for someone to come along and fill me in on the details, and here she was. The moment she came waltzing onto the building site, dressed in a two- piece purple suit and carrying a briefcase, I was attracted to her. To paraphrase Humphrey Bogart; of all the gin joints, in the world, she had to walk into mine

For the duration of the meeting we spoke only on a business level, there was no flirting, not even the slightest suggestion of anything untoward or inappropriate. Her sole objective was to sell me advertising space, which to be honest, wasn’t difficult given I was up to my ears in debt and in dire need of a sale. I’d always been a good judge of character, consequently I knew in an instant this woman was, what we guy’s termed, ‘a straight arrow’.

I would of course like to say it was love at first sight; truth is it was more a case of lust at first sight; nevertheless, it was to become a meeting of opposites. To cut a long story short, we fell in love, left our respective partners and set up home in Glasgow. Hard as we tried, living in Glasgow was slowly tearing us apart. An acrimonious divorce compounded by having to deal with six, yes! Six children (all of varying ages) were proving well nigh impossible, and so, in a moment of madness, we simply cashed in our chips and took off to the States. Unfortunately, as much as I adored America and the American way of life, Helen reckoned it was far to distant to be a real consideration in terms of settling down. In the end, after much debate, we plumped for Spain; the Costa Del Sol to be precise. Helen had already found us accommodation via a Sunday Times ad, and once again it was back to basics.

We hadn’t a clue about the area or the culture, we spoke no Spanish and didn’t know a soul, leaving us with only one conclusion, we had to find our feet, and fast. Eager to learn the ways of our adopted country we agreed this wasn’t the time for sun, sea and sangria, consequently every morning we left the apartment at precisely 8am in search of the action, returning around 9 pm physically and mentally exhausted. It was an onslaught repeated religiously 6 days a week, over the 3-month period until we felt confident enough to become embroiled in the murky ways of the property market.

Now, given we’d had more houses than Wimpey at one time, and moved more times than Pickford’s, we reckoned we needed somewhere to lay our hats and lo and behold by quirk of fate we bumped into a German Estate Agent by the name of Emmer. Emmer was your archetypal Kraut, you know; Crew-cut hairstyle, rimless glasses, missing personality etc. He was nevertheless, as one would expect efficient, even so, I wasn’t a fan. At one point in his life, Emmer had been an East German Policeman and it’s my guess, he, like many on the coast carried a dark secret. The property he was selling belonged to his close friend, and we both reckoned Emmer and his pal shared some guilty history left behind in the rubble walls of East Germany. Emmer was what we Scot’s termed a ‘chancer’. He could certainly think on his feet and my god he’d need to, judging by the volley of questions we’d the temerity to ask.

His German temperament was forever self-evident, always straight and to the point. Not that this unduly bothered me; what did irritate me was, that he was ‘as tight as a duck’s bum’, a trait I’ve always found distasteful. Despite my reservations, he showed us a very interesting penthouse in an older Spanish urbanisation; free from tourists and blissfully private, all of which led us to note interest. After some tedious negotiations, Emmer finally arranged for us to meet with the owner.

Ulle Guttural was the man in question, and once again, he looked every inch a German. Aged sixty-two and stoutly built, Ulle was a very polite individual with a commanding personality and though our meetings were respectful, they were invariably straight and to the point. This guy had truly mastered the art of saying much while revealing little, all of which only served to intrigue us further. Emmer was less of a closed book, and by the time we’d finished talking to him we’d gleaned quite a bit of information on his pal Ulle.

Apparently Mr Guttural joined the foreign legion when he was young man and in many ways as a result became involved in all sorts of skulduggery, before enrolling as a member of the East German Secret Service. Clearly, by the manner in which, he conducted business he’d been trained in the art of double talk and although Emmer was reluctant to get into the specifics, he certainly implied his friend had been a major player in the East German secret service. He further inferred that in order to escape being tried for crimes against the state Ulle had fled to Spain just after the Berlin wall came tumbling down and in doing so had reinvented himself; no big deal on the Costa Del Crime.

The house itself was adorable and Helen wanted it badly, so we harangued Emmer and Ulle until eventually they agreed to sell for what we felt was a reasonable deal. Keys in hand we immediately set about organising transportation for what little furniture we had managed to store at Helen’s friend Claire’s house, and by the time Christmas arrived, we’d a home fit for the arrival of friends and family. We didn’t have to wait long. Distant acquaintances, long lost friends, old workmates and family, all crawled out from under the woodwork in search of a freebie and before long we were being inundated by guests.

We remained there, blissfully happy for a couple of years and would indeed still be there if someone hadn’t come along and offered us ‘daft money’ for the property. It transpires the people who bought from us came from Edinburgh, not that we held that against them, after all their money was as good as anyone’s.

Aware we had less than a month to find a new home, we scoured the area in search of yet another bargain, but to no avail, until one day by chance we spotted an ever so small sign on an ever so small window. Out came the binoculars, down went the phone number and within a matter of hours Helen had made an arrangement to view. This time the agent was a laid back Norwegian by the name of Hilmar, whom we both found extremely affable. Of course, as much as we liked the guy there was no way we were prepared to offer the 395, 000 Euro’s he was asking; we didn’t like him that much!

Once again, it was time to don ‘the hard hat’ and negotiate. I had been negotiating for most of my adult life and the fundamentals remained the same. No matter how much I wanted something, if negotiations became protracted I’d walk the walk. In my (pardon the pun) book ‘no deal’ was better than a ‘bad deal’, and I would not be held to ransom by anyone. With this, uppermost in my mind we met Hilmar and bluffed. Two days later, we reconvened and he double bluffed, and so it went on, until finally I pulled him aside and informed him that if his client did not accept our 345,000-Euro offer within the next 24 hours we’d walk. Next day, with only half-an- hour until the deadline, my new-found Norwegian friend phoned to say that although his client wasn’t happy with the offer, he’d reluctantly accept it. For that split second we were in seventh heaven, until reality kicked in and we realised we didn’t frigging have 345,000 Euro.

Amid the panic, we spoke to a friend of a friend who suggested we give ‘Steve’ a call; Steve? Who the hell’s Steve, I here you ask? Bear with me. ‘Steve the loan shark’ was, as his name suggests, a fixer of loans. He was also as ‘black as a dark night’ and blessed with a body that would put Samson to shame. He didn’t have an office, he had a desk within an office and we soon concluded ‘that if brains were dynamite’ this geezer wouldn’t have enough to blow himself up. Nonetheless, we needed a mortgage and as we, all know ‘there’s a time to run’ and ‘a time to fight’.

To be fair, Steve may not have been ‘connected up stairs’ he was however ‘well connected’ and it was he who set us up with ‘Mau Mi’. Nope it’s not a misprint, Mau Mi was her name and if my memory serves me well she was Dutch. Like many Dutch, Mau Mi was abrasive and to the point, all the same, despite this little misgiving, she somehow successfully brokered a mortgage for us with a Spanish bank, which it has to be said, ‘charged like a wounded bull’ Against all odds, we’d managed to buy into the lifestyle we desired and were as happy as Larry, whoever the hell he is! Painting and decorating, buying new furniture and generally giving the place a makeover kept us out of mischief for a while and in no time we’d settled in nicely, apart that is, for the wee extension I’d been planning.

Although the new apartment was huge, one of the outside terraces didn’t seem to be serving any purpose. It wasn’t directly or indirectly the recipient of any sunshine at any time of the day, therefore I figured why not fill it in and make it a study? Next move was to find a builder; problem was neither of us spoke Spanish. Don’t get me wrong, for the limited period we’d been in Spain we’d mastered enough ‘Spanglish’ to get us through the day, however we were both realistic enough to recognise we’d have our work cut out in (a) finding reliable workers and (b) communicating with them. Fortunately, via regular visits to the local bar, we became acquainted with one or two ‘in the know’ and one such person was Herman.

Herman was a young Argentinean architect who’d been living on the coast for a considerable time. Although initially reluctant to lend a hand or give advice, after a few beers or ten, he relented; enter Guillermo. Guillermo was a handsome young man of around 27 years of age and also Argentinean. Having only recently arrived in Spain with his wife and young child the guy was in dire need of work, consequently we invited him to come to the house, assess the project and quote for the job. He and I both realised his first quote, no matter how reasonable, wouldn’t be acceptable, why? Don’t ask; it’s just the way we do things in the building game.

One or two builders may occasionally get lucky if they come upon a rookie; however, by and large we haggle; have a beer, haggle some more and then settle on a price. Transpires South American’s are no different. The following week Guillermo and his band of merry men arrived at our house, got stuck in and against the odds delivered on time; clearly this young man was one for the future. n less than a month, we’d built, what was to become my nirvana whenever Helen decided to give me earache, or the kids became overbearing. We both adored the house even though it became evident we were by far the poor relations of the urbanisation

Confirmation of our neighbour’s wealth came via the display of top of the range Mercedes, B. M. W’s and Range Rovers sitting alongside our dilapidated Jeep. All of this mattered, not a jot to us, despite their wealth we’d still pass the time of day with them. There were 6 blocks in the urbanisation, each containing nine apartments. In our block, apart from us, we’d a Saudi Arabian family, a Spanish widow and her child, a Finnish woman, a Scandinavian couple, a couple from Edinburgh, a Greek/ English Family, 2 Irish republican’s and lastly a semi- retired Welsh couple.

The head of the Saudi family, i.e. Abdul, was apparently the chap responsible for the supply and control of all the drinking water in Saudi Arabia. His entourage consisted of him, his wife, their three children, three Philippine cleaners, and two ‘on call 24 /7’ chauffeurs. Why two I hear you ask; isn’t that a mite overindulgent? Apparently not. The Brazilian chauffeurs job was to attend the needs of Abdul and his wife, while the Arab chauffeur took the kids (all under the age of 12) to the beach and the park etc. The family transportation comprised, a custom built Range Rover, a BMW and to top all of this, a 46-foot sun seeker boat berthed in Puerto Banus.

Rich beyond our wildest dreams, they came in force every year and stayed for the 3 months of July, August and September. As far as we were aware Saudi’s the world over had a reputation for being dour and introverted, not these Saudi’s. Troupes of flamenco dancers, catering companies, snake charmers; you name it, they hired it. Forget the naive notion that the Saudi’s abstain from consuming alcohol, they don’t. Believe me; this mob could drink my old man (a renowned alcoholic in his day) under the table. Sometimes they overstepped the mark and the noise became almost unbearable, nevertheless we refused to make waves, adopting the view that they were on holiday and thus entitled to party. By way of a peace offering, they invited us, along with one or two of the other neighbours to join them for dinner. Needless to say, although I wasn’t remotely interested in socialising with them, Helen really fancied it, which in effect meant we were going.

At a pre arranged time a ‘stiff’ in a monkey suit knocked on our door and informed us our carriage was ready, and with this we set off in a limo, destination; an extremely posh restaurant on the outskirts of Marbella. Within minutes of arriving, we were introduced to, amongst others, the Saudi Arabian ambassador to Japan, a high-ranking French banking official, a Spanish doctor and a Lebanese executive.

The seating had already been pre- determined. Abdul sat next to the Ambassador to Japan; Helen was between the doctor and the businessman, while I was placed next to Abdul’s wife, Llama. As for the rest, they seemed to have been left to their own devices. I’d like to report some interesting facts, indeed scandal with regards to who said what and to whom, the truth of the matter is, the conversation was immensely boring. In these days of political awareness it seems everyone’s afraid to say anything that may offend and this little get together proved no different. Small talk was the order of the day, which to me seemed a complete waste of my time.

Apart for the fact that Abdul was, by Saudi standards, relatively rich, we learned nothing of the culture or race, except that they doggedly supported Palestine and the Palestinians and surprise, surprise vehemently despised Jews. The only other snippet of gossip came via Llama who revealed that for all of their money they too had problems. Abdul had health issues. For the last 5 years they’d travelled the world, met with countless specialists and yet in the final analysis he’d been left with half a lung. Abdul was living on borrowed time and even a king’s ransom, couldn’t save him.

The situation between the Spanish widow Carmen and her child turned out to be a little more interesting. To look at her you’d think butter wouldn’t melt in her mouth; the truth is the woman had been married to one of the coasts major drug dealers. We only made contact with them because we discovered dampness emanating from an adjoining wall and so we knocked on their door on the pretext of investing the problem and introduced ourselves. The lady of the house seemed pleased to see us and immediately invited us in and it was at this point we met her husband Evarts. Evarts had been diagnosed with having terminal cancer of the spine and had been bedridden for months and I swear to god if I hadn’t known he was a drug dealer, I’d have figured he was either a lawyer or an architect; certainly not a gangster.

According to my trusty sources i.e. the security men of the urbanisation, Evarts had been living in fear of his own and his family’s safety long before developing cancer. In fact, such had been his concern for the well being of his wife and child that courtesy of him a sophisticated security system had been installed in and around the urbanisation. Six months after we met, Evarts died leaving ‘Mary Poppins’ alone to pick up the pieces. The common denominator: lots of money and a death quicker than most.

Of all our neighbours Maija from Finland seemed to be the one we connected with most. Why? I’m not quite sure other than; she lived on her own and was a nice person. In her previous life she’d been a high flying lawyer in Finland, however the recent passing of her husband, due to cancer had a huge impact on how she viewed the future and these days she lived life to the full

I guess it helped that she was worth a bob or two; owned one of the best apartments in the urbanisation and drove a top of the range Mercedes. For the record she also went through boyfriends the way some people go through fish and chips. For all her affluence, the one thing she did not enjoy was good health. The unfortunate woman suffered from Parkinson’s disease, which as you may appreciate ain’t, a bundle of laughs. Apart from her illness we both reckoned she was in good nick for a 70 yr old; that is until we discovered, quite by chance that she was only 58.

A number of years back Maija and her then husband owned a successful timber factory in Finland and as everyone knows; in Finland wood is plentiful. Since the death of her husband and one true love, Maija decided to spend more time in Marbella, as a result when she left Finland she handed the business over to her children, who to be fair were doing a sterling job. All they had to do was keep their Mother in a style she was accustomed to, which I believe they did with aplomb. Not so long ago Maija had it all; a loving husband, terrific career, adorable kids and loads of money. These days however she had no husband, no career, kids who paid her lip service, loads of money and the debilitating disease known as Parkinson’s leaving me conclude that perhaps God had a strange sense of humour.

Apart from having a beautiful, 2 bed apartment and a top of the range Mercedes car in Marbella. Maija also owned a state of the art country cottage, a top of the range Jeep and w-a-i-t for it, a lake in Finland With its own, private man made beach Unfortunately, as much as she’d truly loved her husband, Maija struggled with loneliness and figured that having ‘a man’ ‘any man’ around would be no bad thing. To this end she’d had one or two boyfriends, none more so than the aforementioned Scotsman known as wee Jimmy the piano man.

Of the rest, none stayed the course, until one day having only recently returned to Spain for the summer she met and hooked up with a fellow Fin; enter Christian. Christian was a tall, portly man of around 64 years of age, who, apart from being an alcoholic, was a retired film producer. To be honest when we initially met Christian/ Trista we both suspected he was a bully, which I guess sprung from the fact that when we were in their company he would order Maija to get him this, that or the other; all of which made us feel a mite uncomfortable. Having said that, the more we got to know him and his fellow Fins the more we discovered they were all the same. Transpires Finnish men do have propensity for ordering their woman around; just as the Finnish woman are inclined to inwardly think ‘go fuck yourself!’

For a while things were good between Maija and Christian. Like all Fins they constantly played cards, drank vodka and when the notion took them went fishing. To the outside world everything was rosy in the garden, until that is, they returned from holidaying in Finland at which point the minute the plane touched down in Malaga, Maija called Helen to ask if we’d like to join them for coffee. Of course Helen being a social animal naturally accepted on my behalf!

The reunion was as ever enjoyable. It had been a while since we last saw them and to be honest they seemed to be together and glad to back in La, La land. We, for our part, liked them both and were delighted to see they were together. We could not have got it so wrong. Next evening around 9pm Maija knocked on the door, came in, sat down and announced she’d sent Christian packing, and when I say packing, I do mean packing. According to her, she’d been considering ending the relationship for some time now and just hadn’t had the courage to see it through and so after they’d had coffee with us they returned to her apartment at which point she took a deep breath, sat him down and told him their relationship was over. No if’s, butt’s or maybes; it was over. The poor guy didn’t see it coming. Despite his doe eyed plea’s Maija stuck rigidly to her guns and following day she drove him to the airport and by 5 pm he was gone. To quote Freddie Mercury ‘Another one bites the dust’

Next time we saw Maija she looked like the cat that got the cream. Gone were the frowns and dowdy dresses and in their place a pretty skirts, high heeled shoes and a great big smile. It was as if a weight had been lifted from her shoulders; leaving me to deduce that perhaps she had another man. As for poor Christian he returned to Finland a broken man. No money, no woman, and no prospects. The future wasn’t bright for this 64year old.

For what it worth Maija, in my opinion didn’t handle the situation at all well. Rather than wait until they arrived in Spain before breaking the news to the poor bloke, she should have dropped the bombshell on home soil! At least he would have been saved the humiliation of traipsing all the way to Spain to be told ‘you’re dumped!’ Maija would do well to ponder the old adage ‘what goes round, comes around’ I suspect there’s more mileage in this story.

As anticipated, within days of arriving back in Finland Christian/Trista called to say he was living in a cabin out in the wilds of Finland. Clearly the big man was struggling. The cabin had no electricity or running water and civilisation was a cold and dangerous 3 kilometres away. With no phone line or transportation to rely on, contact with the outside World was, to say the least, intermittent.

According to Trista it became so dark at 6pm that if he held his arm out straight he could not see his fingertips. Judging by his rhetoric the guy was still traumatised by what had happened between him and Maija and was still searching for reasons as to why? she so unceremoniously dumped him. One thing was for sure; fashionable dinner parties, regular jaunts to 5* star Hotels and access to a top of the range Mercedes were fast becoming a memory and sooner rather than later he would just have to accept that he’d blown it; Big time! The maxim ‘you don’t know what you have until it’s gone’ springs to mind. These days he was in bed by 6 pm where he remained until first light of day, which was around 11am

By way of moral support we kept in touch via e-mail which, given his set of circumstances remained sporadic. I did phone him a few times to reassure him that simply because he and Maija had broken up was no reason for him to stay away. As a friend he would always be welcome in our home and I meant it. Alas, to date the big fellow has gone off the radar. That’s not to say he won’t surface at some point.

The fascinating thing about life in a multi cultural community is that almost on a daily basis you tend to bump into immensely interesting people you might otherwise have never met. The next guy sails into this category.

Andrew Vermeer was a white, upper class South African entrepreneur of around 40 years of age, who’d moved into the urbanisation four months prior to us. He’d bought an apartment in the block directly opposite us; therefore not surprisingly when I noticed a skip being delivered outside his apartment I figured he was carrying our reformation work. Hardly surprising, (given I’d spent a large part of my life working in the construction industry) my nose was beginning to get the better of me with regards to what he was up to and so I waited a couple of days and introduced myself. To be fair, he welcomed me like a long lost brother, before handing me a glass of wine and proceeding to show me round the house. At this point Helen appeared on the scene and yet again, he embraced her as if he’d known her for years. Transpires he’d been living alone for a quite some time, which to some extent explains why he was so convivial.

With regards to the skip outside his house, it would seem he’d paid some English guys ‘peanuts’ to carry out major reformation work on his house and as everyone knows if you pay ‘peanuts’ you end up with ‘monkeys’ Unfortunately, he committed the cardinal sin by befriending the workforce; and as any supervisor will tell you, this is a no, no! Bricklayers, plumbers and electricians throughout the world mistake kindness for stupidity and this crew were no different. There’s an old expression in the construction game, which is, and I quote ‘you’re either a c--t or a silly c--t’ unfortunately no one had mentioned this to Andrew. He was a pussy cat with regards to his dealings with the workers; as a result, they ripped him off ‘big time’!

Born and raised in Johannesburg; Andrew was the son of a highly acclaimed scientist, who apart from many other achievements was the man responsible for calculating the precise angle at which a returning spaceship must enter the earth’s atmosphere in order to avoid annihilation. Andrew himself was obviously no numpty; however, as is often the case, intelligence and common sense don’t always go hand in hand.

Educated in a highly prestigious private school, Andrew showed all the tell tale signs of having been raised in Colonial times. He often spoke of his school days and of wearing a straw boater, playing cricket, sipping afternoon tea and being caned! I’m sure you get the picture. According to him, he had never washed a dish, nor made a bed in his entire life, that my dear boy was a job for niggers!

Transpires Andrew had been friendly with a white South African girl for over 19 years, during which time she’d married and divorced his best friend. They kept in touch over the years and when Andrew found out she was as free as a bird, he invited her to spend Christmas with him in Spain. Nicola duly arrived and for the duration of her stay they got on well, which I guess is just a polite way of saying they were at it like rabbits. Fortnight over, she returned to South Africa, while he returned to drinking himself into oblivion. One month later, he called Nicola in Johannesburg and proposed marriage and lo and behold, she accepted. He figured that having known her for all of 19 years, it would be a marriage made in heaven; he couldn’t have been more wrong.

Nicola was also South African and also from a privileged background, indeed many years ago, her Grandparents had been involved in the diamond industry. At one time, they even owned a huge chunk of the Kruger National Park. By the time Nicola reached 21 she’d (not unnaturally, given her background) never worked a day in her life; not that this was ever going to be an obstacle. With a little help from people in high places, she was offered a job in nursing and within a month promoted to the post of state nurse. Of course, Nicola was no more a nurse than I am a brain surgeon and pretty soon, she fucked up big time! During her first week, she administered the wrong drugs to two separate patients, both of whom died within days of one another. These dreadful acts of negligence were of course tantamount to manslaughter and in truth she should have been prosecuted, however as we all know there are ‘rules for those and such as those’ especially in South Africa. I guess she figured Andrew’s proposal of marriage was a slightly better deal than a stretch in jail, consequently she sold