In summer we used to keep crickets in those square Oxo boxes. We made little breathing holes in the lid and fed them pieces of tomato. A pasita was a small cricket. A big one was called un cabezudo and a big black one was called un carbonero. We used to make the crickets crawl from one open hand to the other open hand, on and on just to encorajarlo.

   At an agreed point, your cricket and your opponent’s cricket would be placed in a big carboard box and we would watch them open up their hampas and fight. We used to shout to our respective crickets, encouraging them on, and the other boys watching would take sides and shout encouragement as well.

   At Eastern Beach, some of us boys, used to get together and cross the road into the horse racing track which was there before the war, where the airfield is today. In those days, some of us boys use to wear a white pith helmet, covering our heads against the sun and possible sun-stroke. Hence the phrase los ninos del pish hurled at us by boys who didn’t use them or couldn’t afford them and regarded us users as superior snobs. At the race track we used to look for holes in the ground and using a twig, push it down the hole to see if crickets were hiding inside. Otherwise we had to rely on the Spanish vendors, selling their produce of fruit and vegetables in Gibraltar — if they had crickets to sell, we would buy them.

   Then there was the keeping of the silkworms. A big cardboard box contained about 10 or 12 silkworms. We used to feed them with the leaves of the blackberry tree, which could be found right at the end of the cemetery, at North Front. When we went swimming at Eastern Beach, we boys made a point of jumping over the wall of the cemetery to ‘pinch’ some of those leaves from that tree for our silkworms.

   A time came when the silkworms span their cocoon and disappear inside them. After a time and before the silkworm turned into a moth inside the cocoon, we used to put the cocoon into a cup of warm water and spin and spin the thread into one big ball of silk, at the end of which, the moth was released from inside the cocoon without the cocoon being damaged. If you didn’t do that, then the moth inside would make a messy hole in the cocoon so that it could get out. We had to anticipate that and timing was of the essence to start winding the silk into a ball, otherwise you lost the cocoon and silk. The boy with the biggest silk thread ball would be declared the winner for that year.

   The moths were then released inside the cardboard box, but first we laid a piece of paper papel de estraza inside, so that when the moths started laying their eggs, we would fold and save the paper for the following year. The next summer those tiny fertile eggs would hatch, and little silkworms would start to appear and we would start the process all over again.

   At weekends, my dad used to take my brothers and me, for a ride in the car and he would drive us to North Front, the race track, where we would fly our kites. It was fun getting those things up in the air. The end of the string was wrapped around the hand and you could send up a ‘message’ to the top of the kite. What you did was write your message on a piece of paper about 3x2 inches — there was a very tiny hole in the centre of the paper, big enough to thread the end of the string through — and let the wind take the message up to the kite. We used to jump with joy if we were successful.

   We boys also used to dry out the stones of the apricots and peaches in the sun, then play a game by placing some of the fruit stones at an appropriately elevated level, for example, the steps on the road. We placed a pile of the fruit stones on the high step with us sitting at a lower level, then threw one of the fruit stones up in the air and before catching it on the way down with one hand, try to scoop up as many fruit stones as possible from the pile using the same one hand. If you missed, you lost the game. This game could have been borrowed from the girls who used to play it but using cheap necklace beads.

   Then there were the marbles — a chalk line as a base and starting line and about six feet away a chalk ring in which all the boys taking part in the game would place a marble. Later, a part of the road near a wall had repairs carried out and cemented over and when nearly dried some boy made a ring with his finger, that remained there for years and years afterwards. If your marble was knocked out of the ring when the opponent player flicked his marble towards it, you lost your marble.

   Marbles ricocheted from the wall and before hitting your foot accidentally, the cry from the player was kicks por si pega. The cry would not count, however, if beforehand you had not said sepli (say please). Sometimes, by sheer luck, you would knock your opponent’s marble from the ring, for example if your marble hit the wall and on the way back hit your opponet’s marble out of the ring, you would then win the game by arrebatum, by sheer luck, a fluke. Those were the days, happy days. Next month: The Girls’ Games.