Age 7: 1969 – 70

One night I have a dream. Jesus is in the playground, at the far end, and all the children are running excitedly to gather around him. Except for me. I’m hiding around a corner, taking a peek now and then at what’s going on, but I’m keeping away, because I’m not supposed to be part of this. I feel awkward and afraid.

Being different is troublesome sometimes. Why couldn’t I just have been ‘normal’ (i.e. white, English, Christian)? Then I would have just fitted in with everyone, and I wouldn’t have to be afraid of Jesus.

Age 12: 1974 – 75

There are a few racist lowlife even in my school. It’s amazing that they could have passed the exam. They are racially abusive and bullying towards me, for being a Paki, the only one in the school at this time (there are a couple of Indians and one black boy). There is too much talk in the media and the gutter press about immigrants, who come over here and take people’s jobs, or get unemployment benefits (or both). The lowlife need to focus on the threat of immigrants in order to give themselves a feeling of superiority. So, they focus on me. The funny thing is, I can understand their point of view. From their perspective, why wouldn’t they resent immigrants? They even have their own political party, the National Front, whose key policy is that all coloured immigrants should be repatriated, sent back home.

This causes me great concern. I imagine having to live in Pakistan, not just visit there. I can’t read or write Urdu and I speak it clumsily, with an English accent. I don’t see such an outcome as impossible. Something much worse happened in Germany not so long ago, so why couldn’t such events happen here? And we darkies stick out a lot more than European Jews.

The worst example of the lowlife is Peldman. He is in the year above me. He has long, untidy hair, and a sullen face with an ugly black mole. He wears his school uniform in a deliberately shabby way, the tie knotted carelessly, not reaching the bottom of his shirt.

Normally, I would have no interaction with a pupil in the year above. But Peldman decides to insert himself, uninvited, into my life. To him, I am a Paki who is not welcome in his country. I can never pass him in the corridors or the cloisters without him making this point and subjecting me to verbal abuse. This causes me always to have an element of tension as I walk around the school, and actual fear if I see him coming the other way. On one occasion he spits at me and a huge glob of his repulsive saliva lands on my head. I tamely wipe it off. I don’t seem to have any other options. There’s no question of complaining to a teacher; that would be pathetic. I assume that racial abuse is a normal part of life, as I am a foreigner and I am different.

This is the only thing that clouds my experience of this school.

Age 13: 1975 – 76

I am proud of my school. It was one of the best grammar schools, it is very dignified and it has high standards.

One afternoon my father is washing his VW Fastback on the driveway. Some of the older boys from my school go past on their bikes; it is just after four o’clock and they are in uniform. One of them calls out to my father: ‘Bloody immigrants!’ My father looks slightly hurt – surprised rather than angry. Fortunately he did not see the badges on their blazers, so he doesn’t know for sure that these boys were from Hampton School. I am deeply ashamed of this behaviour. They can insult me in school, but how dare they insult my father in public.

Age 16: 1978 – 79

We are all loitering in our classroom one lunchtime. Barry Sutton suddenly asks me a question out of the blue. ‘Hey Imran! Are your parents going to arrange your marriage?’ He is serious and genuinely interested.

Everyone’s attention is suddenly upon me. They are all interested too. Arranged marriage is something that always happens in any television programme in which Asian characters appear. Does it apply to Imran?

This is the unspeakable demon which has lurked in my mind for years. It has never been discussed overtly at home, but there has always been an implicit assumption that this will be the case. Any other process will cause a huge conflagration in my family. (I imagine being asked as a grown up, ‘Where did you meet your wife?’ and having to answer, ‘At our wedding.’) I can’t bear to think about it. I want to be like James Bond or Simon Templar. They don’t have arranged marriages.

‘No, of course not!’ I tell the class, with forced joviality.