Meat on a Stick

John Emin

Description

Assassinations, recriminations, a near-death experience with a suicidal flying examiner, love at first sight, a ghost or two, or three, a famous half-sister, visiting heaven and hell, inventing the hydrofoil and getting caned for it, a naked plumber, a TV wrestler's trouble in the bedroom, cleaning out a casino and then throwing it all away, helping John Major fight the Kuwait oil fire, dowsing for dead people, patents and planning decisions, lies, truths and uncertainties. Following a fairly serious motor accident in 2005 which damaged a disc in my neck, I had then, along with the pain of a trapped nerve which kept me awake at night, the luxury of time that I never previously enjoyed to reassess some of the more curious things that have happened to me during my time on this earth. Some of these things are only now beginning to make sense to me. Others perhaps never will. Taken as a whole, all of them lead me inexorably to believe that mankind is far greater than the simple reflection we see of ourselves in the mirror.

Sujets

• Philosophie et théologie
• Memoir

Informations

• Publié par: Austin Macauley Publishers
• Date de parution: 31 mai 2019
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781528958806
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 1 Mo

Extrait

Meat on a Stick
John Emin
Austin Macauley Publishers
2019-05-31
Meat on a Stick About the Author About the Book Dedication Copyright Information Acknowledgement Prologue Revelation Introduction Chapter One Christos Chapter Two The School Bullies Chapter Three The Eureka Moment Chapter Four Love at First Sight Chapter Five X Marks the Spot Chapter Six Doppelgänger Fetch Chapter Seven Bill’s Bath Time Chapter Eight Learning to Fly Chapter Nine Rocky’s Little Problem Chapter Ten Good People and Bad People Chapter Eleven Mick and the Kuwait Oil Fires Chapter Twelve The Car Accident Chapter Thirteen Beginner’s Luck Chapter Fourteen Reflections of Past Events Chapter Fifteen A Thousand Strangled Cats on a Slow Train to Ankara Chapter Sixteen Heaven and Hell Chapter Seventeen Meat on a Stick
About the Author
The author was born in Cyprus in 1944 to a happy but somewhat-unconventional family. John came to England in 1948 and was educated in London. He has been very happily married to Barbara since 1969, having run a business with his wife. John has three children, two boys and one girl, and a football team of grandchildren.
About the Book
Assassinations, recriminations, a near-death experience with a suicidal flying examiner, love at first sight, a ghost or two, or three, a famous half-sister, visiting heaven and hell, inventing the hydrofoil and getting caned for it, a naked plumber, a TV wrestler’s trouble in the bedroom, cleaning out a casino and then throwing it all away, helping John Major fight the Kuwait oil fire, dowsing for dead people, patents and planning decisions, lies, truths and uncertainties.
Following a fairly serious motor accident in 2005 which damaged a disc in my neck, I had then, along with the pain of a trapped nerve which kept me awake at night, the luxury of time that I never previously enjoyed to reassess some of the more curious things that have happened to me during my time on this earth. Some of these things are only now beginning to make sense to me. Others perhaps never will. Taken as a whole, all of them lead me inexorably to believe that mankind is far greater than the simple reflection we see of ourselves in the mirror.
Dedication
In loving memory of my father, Enver Emin, who played a large part in my life by showing me, by his experiences, what I should not do. For that
I am forever grateful.
Copyright Information
Copyright © John Emin (2019)
The right of John Emin to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with section 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publishers.
Any person who commits any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.
A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library.
ISBN 9781788488013 (Paperback)
ISBN 9781528908115 (Hardback)
ISBN 9781528958806 (ePub e-book)
www.austinmacauley.com
First Published (2019)
Austin Macauley Publishers Ltd
25 Canada Square
Canary Wharf
London
E14 5LQ
Acknowledgement
I wish to acknowledge the help I had from Matt Tulloch, who helped put the book together. I would also wish to acknowledge the considerable help my wife, Barbara, gave over the months it took to write this book.
Prologue

Revelation
May 2010
I once asked Mandy, my trusted secretary, whether she knew who her people were and where they came from. Without hesitation, she began to reel off the story of her family. She was the second of two daughters, she said. Her mother worked at the local town hall offices where her mother, in turn, had worked before her, while her father chose the butchering profession rather than following his father who was a docker at Surrey Docks here in London. Her grandfather and several generations before him were all London dockers, Mandy told me, and they had jobs for life, all of them being strong union men who could flex their muscles and keep their employers, if not honest, then at least a close approximation of it. That was until they pushed their luck and went on strike so much that they all eventually lost their jobs as the docks were forced to close down and they had to go elsewhere.
Mandy had done so well, I was impressed. She knew exactly who she was and where she came from. I had thought that I could do that too, but with a little more consideration, I became aware that there were great gaps and riddles in our family history of which I was alarmingly ignorant.
Upon recently becoming the head of the Emin family, on account of my own father’s passing, some of these secrets have begun to be relayed to me by those within the family who each treasure a little piece of the puzzle. And my word, what a puzzle it is turning out to be, with religion, betrayal and huge wealth all tangled up together. I confess that I am still getting my own head around it all, so the prospect of explaining everything to you is somewhat daunting. Nevertheless, I shall do my best and perhaps together we will be able to make some sense of the events contained in this book, and furthermore explore through them the fragile notion of who we are, as human beings, and where we have come from.
The true beginnings of my foray into the Emin family history began in the unlikely surroundings of a steam room at the local baths in Lewisham, around 1990 if I remember accurately. I had strained my back at work and my wife Barbara suggested that I went along to the baths to see if the water in its various forms could ease the problem.
There were three saunas there, each with a different level of heat, a steam room and just outside of that a cold plunge pool to take the edge off. It was a pleasant enough arrangement, and after a short time I found myself relaxed and enjoying the amenities, blissfully unaware that my resting mind was about to become busier than it had been in quite some time.
It was whilst in the steam room that I noticed an old man sitting on the bench opposite, watching me with a distinct curiosity in his demeanour. I shook my head clear and thought nothing more about it until all of a sudden the man found his voice.
“Tell me,” he said casually, “how is your father?”
“Fine,” I replied, covering my surprise, “he’s fine.” I squinted a little at the man, trying to place him. “Do I know you?” I asked finally, giving up on the task.
“Of course you do,” he replied, almost admonishingly.
Still puzzled, I got up and went over to sit next to this strange man who was, clearly, in the most charitable sense possible, nearing the end of his time on this Earth. I tried to imagine him younger, without the wrinkles, but after a moment it was his eyes that gave him away.
“Uncle Devrish?” I asked, “Is that you?”
“I knew you knew who I was!” Devrish smiled. “I knew who you were at once, even though I haven’t seen you in… must be going on thirty years now.”
The steam was getting to me by now, so I suggested that we adjourn to one of the cooler sauna rooms so that we might talk more comfortably.
The Dervish Hassan family, from which Devrish came, his mother being my great aunt share a history with the Emins.
Here in England, we’re used to being able to trace our families back many generations by means of the simple device that is the surname. Muslim families are not nearly so simple, even now I question the given name of my great, great, grandfather, though Abdullah seems to have been prominent in our family. The children of old Muslim families might be given their father’s chosen name, sometimes their grandfather’s too, there are family names and in some countries tribal names and all kinds of combinations, and it gets, frankly, rather complicated. Sufficed to say that the Hassan’s and Emins are first cousins, which made Devrish and my father first cousins too. I had heard some of the stories from when the two of them were growing up together, we all knew within the family that Devrish helped curb some of my father’s more outrageous impulses, and on several occasions had reason to give Dad’s ears a good boxing. The last time that had happened, followed Dad trying to pull a fast one in regard to a large property deal that he and Devrish were partners in. The two of them had some forty houses between them, all bought and paid for and profitable. It was a good arrangement. Unfortunately, nothing is quite so simple in matters where my father was involved with large sums of cash, as I discovered myself in the sixties when he pulled a similar thing with me.
In Devrish and Dad’s case, the fall-out from their disagreement over this business arrangement way back in the fifties was such that they barely spoke again after that. My auntie tried to bring them together once in a while, but Devrish always resisted her overtures. The old man looked me in the eye now, in the comfortable heat of the sauna, and seemed to be at great pains to emphasise that this lengthy estrangement was not due to the holding of a grudge over money, or pride, or any such thing. Blood is thicker than water, he said, and most problems, no matter how acrimonious, can be resolved over time. No, it seemed that there was something else my dad wanted from Devrish. Something important that his cousin didn’t want to give up. At least that seemed to be the gist of what he was trying to tell me.
To be honest, I thought that the old man was just rambling. He said a lot of things that I cannot fully recall just now, about how it would all become clear in time, about how he had written a book that would surprise us all regarding the family and the things that he himself had seen and done. He talked of a huge house with high walls, dishing out pots of food to the poor, and something about a black horse.