What happened.

So recently he was a little boy who loved playing snakes and ladders, painting and choosing a story for Granny to read.

Now, its football, Monopoly, and quite suddenly, chess.

He is growing up so fast. He reassured me that when he is grown up I will still be alllowed to give him a hug because I will still be his Granny.

Playing chess with him gave me quite a jolt as it reminded me of a game that will stay in my memory forever.

I had just returned to Bandar Abbas from quick trip to Teheran to sign some documents for the house we were buying in Italy.

The time spent in Teheran was memorable in itself; chinese dinner with prawns and a race to the airport the following morning.

As we rode along the motorway at a mad speed, the bonnet flew up and totally blocked the vision of the Iranian driver who managed to stop the car in safety.

I then got a pair of tights out of my bags and we tied the bonnet down and continued the journey.

Back in Bandar Abbas, someone had organised a chess tournament and being a good sport, I decided to take part. With Luca, two and a half, (now 39) sleeping somehow or other on my knees, I played a game against a certain Alan, husband of a certain ANNE blipper and lost.

During the night (the prawns?????) I got appendicitis. It wasn't diagnosed and in a ferw days, I found myself in the foulest place on earth with peritonitis and too ill to fly anywhere.

A military Iranian surgeon and a local gyny operated on me and saved my life, and I regained consciousness in a room with sewage oozing out from under the wash basin by my bed.

It was several months later and a long stay in Teheran before I recovered completely,