South Indian I British
Mum & Dad
My Father is of South Indian descent but grew up in Malawi until he was 20 when he emigrated to Britain. My Mum hails from North Wales but has spent most of her adult life in the south of England. Having a mixed relationship in Britain in those days was a pretty brave thing to do. I admire them for that.
Early years
I was aware of race from a very early age, for the simple fact that my Dad was always the easiest person to find during our weekly shop in the local supermarket. He was the only one. Apart from one time when he wasn’t and as a young boy I ran over and hugged the leg of a random stranger. I was more weirded-out than embarrassed.
So do I like being mixed-race? Yes, I wouldn’t want it any other way. However, growing up in rural England meant my ‘mixedness’ confused other people and, by default, myself. Until age 14, there was only 1 other non-White person in my entire school. Despite my English accent, I continue to be asked - to this day - ‘where are you from?’ with the most frequent guesses being Brazil, Turkey or North Africa.
A Colourful Idea
At school I remember once being referred to as ‘coloured’ by a particularly old fashioned yet delightful teacher. I can’t remember why he said it but when he did, I liked it. It may now be ‘un-pc’ but linguistically it’s just a great word. Less anodyne than ‘mixed-race’ without any of the clunkiness of ‘people of colour’. Anyway, who would not want to be ‘coloured’? More to the point, who would want to be ‘colourless’? I love vivid colours so the very word ‘coloured’ feels good to me. I know it has negative historical connotations but frankly I think it should be reclaimed and used by all mixes of mixed-race people - could it unite us all? Whacky thought, I know.
A Jam Jar of India
I first went to India’s Malabar coast to visit family aged 7. I loved it so much that when it was time to come home, I tried to take a photo on my disposable camera, on the hot tarmac outside the tin-shed terminal building. Immediately a tall camouflaged guard with an AK47 marched up to me and barked ‘no photos’. Not wanting to argue with such a person, I came up with a different solution. I scurried to the rusty wire fence at the edge of the strip where I took off one of my little white sports socks and filled it up with a handful of tropical red earth before we got on the plane home. I later emptied it into a jam jar and kept it in my bedroom for years!
So as you can tell I feel a deep connection to India. When I’m there, strangers often address me in Hindi, yet in England I’m rarely seen as ethnically English. I guess this is unsurprising - after all India has 4X the genetic diversity of all the European countries put together.
Town vs Country
In the U.K. I’ve noticed that other multi-ethnic people who grew up in the countryside, tend to have had a very different experience to those in towns and cities. It was easy to feel ‘different’ because of the total lack of non-Whites in rural areas during the 90s & 2000’s. I often felt an undercurrent of ‘casual racism’ but most people were curious rather than malicious. At 6ft 3 I wasn’t an easy target but I was still affected by others’ hostility. As a young kid, a couple of nastier experiences centred around playing football which is why I abruptly lost interest in it, but that’s a story for another time.
As a teen, I got incredibly bored of explaining myself. One guy inexplicably got it in his head that I was ‘from South Africa’. At the time I was fascinated with Nelson Mandella’s idea of a ‘rainbow nation’ - so, rather than correct him, I rolled with it for a bit. Looking back I can see I was insecure about where I was from.
Also, my name seems to cause people huge confusion. In the 16th century Indian Hindus who were (often forced) to convert to Christianity by the Portuguese, adopted Portuguese surnames. However most people don’t know that, so when they ask me to explain my ethnicity, they can’t process how the name is Indian. Their confusion is compounded by the fact that I’m told I look Brazilian, whereas my surname is in fact a super common name!
Becoming An Adult
At the start of uni it got round that I was ‘half Sri Lankan’, which is very nearly right, geographically, and makes logical sense as my surname is a common name there. It’s still a different country though! So again I remember rolling with it, out of laziness, before soon releasing that I should correct people.
This whole thing would be a lot easier if I was called ‘Lawrence Patel’ or Suresh Smith. However I rather like my name so it’s worth the effort.
I moved to London after uni in 2012 - an unexpected joy to be somewhere so diverse. This last year, I’ve found myself as an occasional presenter on BBC 1. I’ve come to realise that race is partly a motivation for doing this - it’s about being properly ‘seen'. Ultimately, I love being mixed and I’m now very optimistic about diversity & race in the U.K. We’ve come so far.