{"id":437,"date":"2010-04-09T11:56:10","date_gmt":"2010-04-09T11:56:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/institutocervanteslondon.wordpress.com\/?p=437"},"modified":"2010-04-09T11:56:10","modified_gmt":"2010-04-09T11:56:10","slug":"the-quijote-in-my-life-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.cervantes.es\/londres\/2010\/04\/09\/the-quijote-in-my-life-2\/","title":{"rendered":"The Quijote in my life"},"content":{"rendered":"

1st prize<\/span> Category 7-11 y. o.<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"My Don Quijote is my Grandad\u00a0Fred. He was born\u00a0in 1939 in Liverpool, just before World War II\u00a0started. His dad was also called Fred and was the 7th son of a 7th son.\u00a0 This was supposed to be lucky but he was miserable and angry.\u00a0 To avoid him, Fred and his dog called Rinty used to have lots of adventures down at Dam woods; they caught rabbits for his mum to cook for tea. He had good imagination; for example, he pretended his name was Frederick Harvey Winstanley Norman however his wife, two Daughters and Son believed this for 20 long years, even though his name was Frederick Norman.<\/p>\n

When he was 10, people started cutting down Dam woods to build Liverpool Airport. He saw the airplanes landing and he imagined what it was like to live in a different country. When he exclaimed to his friends that he wanted to travel and live in sunny countries, they rudely pointed out, \u2018You\u2019re not brave enough.\u00a0 Why do you want to do that? That\u2019s rubbish.\u2019 But Fred still wanted to live his dream and he believed in himself.<\/p>\n

My Grandad has a quest for adventure; at the age of 15, he joined the Merchant Navy.\u00a0 Where he travelled around the world! \u00a0He saw: sunny blue skies, deserts and\u00a0smelled the salty sea; he wanted to feel the warm weather and taste\u00a0different foods and spices.\u00a0<\/p>\n

One day he went on a boat from Liverpool to take goods to India, the quickest way was to\u00a0sail through the Suez Canal.\u00a0However, at that time, there was a war called the Suez crisis – he was on this canal when they shut the gates tight. He wondered if a bomb might hit his boat and explode the Canal.\u00a0 He was stuck there for several weeks!\u00a0 He was only 16.<\/p>\n

My Grandad went to Brazil and Argentina, where after drinking beer at the port, he missed his ship and spent two days with no sleep and no food, chasing it to another port, miles up the river Plate.\u00a0 The Captain fined him two weeks pay.\u00a0 He travelled to the Caribbean, India and North America, where he bought Elvis Presley records before he was even heard of in England!\u00a0<\/p>\n

Grandad wore suits he had made very cheaply in Singapore. He was wearing one when he met Grandma, when he was back in Liverpool.\u00a0 My Grandma\u2019s step-mum thought that my Grandad was a trouble maker because he wore a red tie and fancy suits.\u00a0 She married him anyway.\u00a0 Now my Grandad and Grandma live in Spain.\u00a0 Grandma is like Grandad\u2019s Sancho Panza.<\/p>\n

When we visit them in Spain, we get caught up in Grandad\u2019s adventures. \u00a0He always gets lost; we once drove to a restaurant which was supposed to be 5 miles away; we took one of Grandad\u2019s \u201cshortcuts\u201d and 30 miles later we finally arrived!\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

I think, like Don Quijote and my Grandad, you should be brave and live your dream.<\/p>\n

My Grandad encouraged his family to travel; my mum has lived and worked in Saudi Arabia and has visited many countries.\u00a0 My Grandad is still living his dream; he won\u2019t wake up as Alonso Quijana like poor Don Quijote.<\/p>\n

Alex V.
\nPark Road Community Primary School<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

1st prize Category 7-11 y. o. My Don Quijote is my Grandad\u00a0Fred. He was born\u00a0in 1939 in Liverpool, just before World War II\u00a0started. His dad was also called Fred and was the 7th son of a 7th son.\u00a0 This was supposed to be lucky but he was miserable and angry.\u00a0 To avoid him, Fred and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[70,54],"tags":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.cervantes.es\/londres\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/437"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.cervantes.es\/londres\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.cervantes.es\/londres\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.cervantes.es\/londres\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.cervantes.es\/londres\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=437"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.cervantes.es\/londres\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/437\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.cervantes.es\/londres\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=437"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.cervantes.es\/londres\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=437"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.cervantes.es\/londres\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=437"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}