NONFICTION
TO BE A TOKEN A memoir of A British Indian growing up in Essex
by Shiv Rayani
1. Better Get Used To It
the cutare stuffed straight into their pockets, ready for the playground battles tomorrow.
Rayne, 1993.
I am trundling back home from my first “Oi, boffin!” Woodsy shouts. “Come here day at 'big school'. An unspoilt red reading with your bag!” packet flails by my shins. Mum opens the I don't like being called 'boffin', but it beats door. She's flipping chippattis with one hand all the other names I'm teased with. It started whilst hoovering incense ash with the other. last summer when I devised a master plan to win the duck race. So they call me 'boffin' “How was school, beta?” because I'm the smart one. Smart enough to She fixes me with that look. The one that bring a bag for harvesting conkers, anyway. wants a premature update on her 5 year-old I dive into the enclave of a horse chestnut boy's medicine doctorate. But she knows tree to find them foraging through autumnal something's up. Mum's always do. debris. Fish buries handful after handful into “They keep calling me a Paki,” I half explain. my Woolies bag before dragging his grubby palms up his school trousers and sweatshirt. Her posture slumps. One wafer of slapped I copy him. I copy everything they do. dough melts from her palm unto the pristine Because they're my friends. floor which opens up around me. She falls to her knees, cupping my little face. The stove Woodsy marvels at this one bulky specimen. hisses away unattended. I can't tell if she's We crowd around and 'woah' it to death. He places it in my hands. It's that big. angry or sad. “You are not a bloody Paki … YOU ARE “You can beat Thicky Nicky with this one,” he says. Fish gently concurs. Because they're INDIAN!” my best friends. And I love them. Mum puts it down to geographical *** incompetence. But I know it's more than that. And I'm outnumbered. So I better get Dad opens the front door to see the sun used to it. set behind his mudsmeared, grass-stained eldest. It's not his idea of extracurricular toil. Fast. He sinks me with that look. The one that 2. Extracurricular Toil transcends trouble from father to son as soon Shalford, 1996. as I walk in. Woodsy and Fish. They're my friends. He has his way with me and then the They're excitedly unearthing shiny conkers studying begins. Maths followed by English from their prickly cocoons. Those that make and then Verbal Reasoning. I have to pass March 2016
Litro Magazine 19