Chitty Chitty Blog Blog

I hope the lawyers of Ian Fleming's estate aren't working long hours over Christmas. If they are, then I'd better watch out as they might not like the title of this piece of writing and they could send some nasty men my way. Well, when you've got the creator of 007 James Bond at your disposal, even when you seem to be dead you can do some very frightening things!

Right now, most people in England are too busy watching their villains, heroes, champions and chucklers on the television- or reading about them in books- to go in search of trouble in the often horrid world outside. I bet you're doing the same! Apart from which, spies don't like freezing, they prefer to come in from the cold. Whoops, better watch it or I'll have another famous author after me who wrote spy stories. Sorry Mr Cornwell (and there's a small prize for any of you down by the sea if you can tell me that writer's pen name!).

Television at this time of year can be great fun to watch and very comforting, like the best stories which always have a happy ending. I had cause on Christmas Eve to experience a rather different Christmas Eve, with my brother and some friends, German-style. Over in Deutschland, like much of Europe, they don't have quite such a long wait to open their presents, and all the excitement of unwrapping and trying out the new toys come on that most beautiful and twinkling night of the year when the little star is the baby of Bethlehem, who was and is the best present of all.

German television at Christmas is full of lovely little programmes and beautiful music and images which are a feast for the eyes while you wait for the feast for your tummy, which is the traditional Christmas Eve meal of sausage salad.

Along with the stollen and the mince pies, this was our Christmas Eve memorable munch. Matthew and I really enjoyed spending Heiligernacht, the Holy Night, with our friends and the next day we had a great nosh too with our own full English Christmas Dinner- in an Italian restaurant! Mind you, we made sure we didn't eat too much food at once: that's not good for you, of course. If you have over-eaten this Christmas, dear reader, perhsps you'd do well to take the advice of Professor Stanley Unwin:

"If you've done an overstuffy in the tumloader, finisht the job with a ladleho of brandy butter, then go all the way to the toileybox."

Well, quite, very clear advice. Almost as good as his words of gobbledegook wisdom as Chancellor of a sort-of-German place in the wonderful film of Ian Fleming's only children's book Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, which made an appearance on ITV1 yesterday.

This has been a favourite family film of mine ever since I saw it as a lad of ten during the summer holidays with my brother and the three little boys and their Mum who were our neighbours over the road, the Povalls. Chitty has since gone on to be a very succesful stage show, of course, and -yes- the car really can "fly"!

There are some sad bits and some really joyful bits in CCBB. Lots of good dancing, some nice songs and of course loads of surprises. I still remember my sadness now though at all the little boys and girls who were locked up in the dark by the awful childcatcher, far away from the joys and toys of playing outside, despite the efforts of the toymaker to help them and keep them safe. The jealous and terrible baron and his wife did not like and would not permit children in their country of Vulgaria. When I saw this bit of the film, I looked over at my best friend of the time, and wondered what he was thinking about these sad happenings.

In films and in books, you will find things to make you laugh as well as make you cry. None of us like to cry, but it's a part of life we all experience from time to time. In the Christmas story in the gospels, it may seem out of place, but important to remember that bad king Herod got rid of all the tiniest children, under two,of Bethlehem(except Jesus, who escaped to Egypt with his parents, as scripture predicted). How awful that must have been for the mothers of that time, and indeed for older borthers and sisters. We remember them still today on what is known as Holy Innocents, the 28th December.

However, crying does not last forever and believe it or not for all its horrible happenings and the wicked things people still do to each other, for many of us our stories will have a "happy ending" The inspired writers of the greatest book of all tell of it, and it has been filmed with its many different "chapters" and stories so many times, because to many people like us it contains the most important, true happenings in history. Can you tell what it is yet (where's Rolf Harris? Probably busy painting the Queen!) It has sold more copies than anything else ever printed- more even than James Bond or, indeed, than The Railway Children. Now there's a story worth seeing and reading time and time again!

I would gladly have watched The Railway Children right through, if it wasn't on at the same time I was out for my Christmas lunch. It's wonderful, full of engines of all different colours, and steam and whistles, a friendly helpful stationmaster and a kindly old gentleman, and children doing all sorts of special things for other people or saving them from disaster. Meanwhile, their very caring mother writes stories, to earn some money while their father has been sent away to jail for something he was supposed to have done wrong. Whereas in fact, he was innocent of any crime.

Does it have a happy ending? Of course it does, though in fact very few people can't cry when they see it. When you hear eldest daughter Roberta cry through the mist of the train's steam.. Well, I don't want to spoil it for you if you have never seen the film, but have your tissues ready.

I've loved writing ever since I was a little boy. Indeed, I used to produce a small magazine which I'd sell to my schoolchums for three old pennies, called Hey Presto! Perhaps I ought to give that as a new title for this blog, seeing as I'm not the first to bag the title Anyway... But it's not the title that matters, it's what you write in the stories that you write that you inform, entertain, intrigue and please your readers. I hope you've enjoyed reading this little story about a little part of my life, and whether you're large or small yourself, why not get writing?

Whatever you write though, oh best beloved, remember that the greatest happy ending has yet to come, and that will be in real life for us all. It will be "Just So", to borrow the title of some wonderful little stories written by Rudyard Kipling for his children about how things came to be the way they are. The best selling book of all time still remains The Holy Bible, which tells the story of God's love for man and of his adventures with us, especially through his only son Jesus.

When we see Jesus, along with his father, face to face at the end of time, as the Bible tells us we surely will, then I happily expect we too will run to him and cry "Daddy, my Daddy"! Now there's the best ending of all for you to this anytime story.