An Act Of Balance

I have to admit, this one’s tough. It’s taken me several attempts to get anywhere with it at all. Better to begin this blog with the trickiest subject first and rip that plaster clean off.

I’ve watched with interest recent media coverage of multi-heritage people articulating their experiences; always feeling in-between. The focus has, understandably, been on those who have a white British parent and one from another background; brought up in the UK but with well-cultivated ties to the land of their other parent.

My own situation’s a little different, and I owe it to myself to convey this wash of feelings accurately. Here goes...

I am other; the son of an English mother, and an Iraqi father.

I just don’t belong.

My mixed blood is unseen and unacknowledged. Not enough of either and yet at times, too much altogether.

I grew up feeling I could never authentically embrace a heritage or identity, and the world continued to underscore that qualm when I least expected it.

I’m incredibly proud of my background. DNA and family history reliably inform me that I’m Arab and English, with some Circassian, Georgian, Ashkenazi and African heritage thrown in for good measure. A descendant of resourceful nomads bettering themselves; generations uprooting from or to something.

I’m also proud of who I am as a person. I’ve a grounded, understated self-confidence and an optimism that sustains me through the darkest of days.

But.

But.... it’s still there. The lack of place. An ever-present unspoken apology for confounding expectations. Granted, a secure sense of belonging isn’t paramount but its absence, unaddressed, promotes an unease that’s insidiously detrimental.

~~~~~~~~~~

Going back to the beginning, I spent all of my childhood in Iraq, before coming to the UK. When we moved abruptly in 1992, very little residual Arab culture came with us; for Dad, the split from his home country was too painful, too raw to do anything but look ahead, and adapt. I was starting from scratch.

Still a child, I’d left behind a way of life and my entire Iraqi family, save for two cousins in East Anglia we rarely saw. With Mum and Dad necessarily occupied with finding work and a place to live, and my brother perhaps being too young to share a feeling of displacement, it was hard to accept that our move here was permanent. Processing it fully and grieving appropriately was out of the question.

The antithesis to the turmoil of Baghdad, we eventually settled in Berkhamsted, a town almost comically reserved and middle class. A members-only club with new absolutes: weather was grey, people were white, upper lips stiff and conceit thinly-veiled.

I quickly learned that any unexpected display of emotion or difference resulted in either overt (at school) or covert ostracisation (everywhere else).

First tentative encounters in education were…. challenging. Waltzing into a Church of England middle school with my “fringe and inshallah” haircut, hairy top lip and humongous NHS glasses, future me’s genuinely shocked that my appearance wasn’t pounced on. A missed opportunity for the bullies, but the breezy transition to UK life didn’t materialise, regardless.

Brushing off a few “do you love Saddam?”s was child’s play; my Achilles’ heel was the way I spoke. My prim and proper English lacked all of the necessary colloquialisms. The spotlight swiftly hovered over me, and kids that age love an easy target.

Their main bone of contention? I repeatedly made the rookie error of gesturing when I spoke; using my hands and body language was second nature, as it is all over the Middle East.

In the well ‘ard laddish ‘90s, this naturally made me a “queer” and a “poof”, and I had to endure regular grillings aimed at catching me out. “Do you like men or women?” was a particular favourite, mining new depths of subtlety.

“Perhaps they know something I don’t?” I eventually wondered charitably, willing my uncooperative hands to stay put.

Always one to do my due-diligence, I checked. Even under the mind-bending influence of puberty, a brief deliberation and I was still fairly convinced that in fact, I wasn’t gay at all. It made no difference.

Bewildered, I compiled a mental checklist: don’t gesture, don’t speak too well, don’t appear too clever. Actually, problem solved: just don’t speak at all! Being English was hard work, and I didn’t even think I wanted to be. I just wanted to “be”.

It seemed that being of mixed background was almost an affront to people’s established suppositions: “Damn it, you mean we’re going to have to combine our stereotypes?”

Not feeling much simpatico from my white peers, I tried to cosy up to the trio of Asian kids in my school year, but they certainly weren’t sure what to make of me: “I thought only brown people came from the Middle East?”, I was confidently reminded.

There were many other low key My name would be called out at appointments, and I’d be ignored when I confirmed it was me. And I was bloody hard to miss! Alternatively, I’d be subjected to a surreptitious body scan, as if looking at me from a different angle might reveal all. “Where does he hide it?”

In adulthood, even my therapist, whose professionalism should’ve precluded her from offering any personal views, stuck her oar in. When I broached the subject of conflicted identity with her; that people had trouble believing I was of mixed heritage, her reaction was one of unfiltered solidarity.. with them!

“Yeah, because you don’t look Iraqi at all” she laughed, bouncing back in her chair as if it’d been something she’d been meaning to get off her chest for months.

Death by a thousand cuts, or unsolicited judgements.

Everyone gamely trotted out their verdict. Most weren’t overtly cruel or ignorant; making it hard to challenge them with authority. Easier to let things slide, and begin to think I was being overly churlish. Allowing them to erode my confidence, piece by piece; a silent deconstruction.

At this point, I’ll attempt to be fair: first impressions do count for a lot. They shouldn’t, but we’re all hardwired to react strongly to the superficial.

By my mid-teens I’d raced up to 193 cm in height, I was light-skinned and had no trace of an accent. Nowadays, though I dislike the term, I’m what you’d consider “white assumed”. I had many of the privileges of a whiter skin, but also bore witness to the layer of racism and xenophobia beneath the pleasant masks my peers and neighbours wore.

Adding insult to injury, when genetics instructed my dark hair to desert me in my twenties, my final conspicuously Arab feature was betraying me. Celestial revenge for growing a ponytail at uni and going to metal gigs? God doesn’t seem the headbanging type. Perhaps he’d sagely decided I couldn’t be trusted to get a decent haircut.

He had a point.

Just how could I represent both sides of my identity? I wanted to, I desperately wanted to be seen; my experiences had cleaved my identity apart. But how? I winced at the options:

• Self tanning products: a tinge of Marbs-for-a-week might Arabise me a bit?

• Perhaps I could wear contacts so that my darker eyes didn’t look like p*ssholes in the snow?

• What else..... put on a shady accent?

• Wear an Arab scarf? Walk around diligently thumbing a set of worry beads??

I began to fall victim to farcical stereotype-hunting myself, bereft of a viable way to project who I was. Would I be seen to be appropriating my own culture?!

Along the way, I searched in vain for positive role models to help foster my heritage; Arab representation in the media was limited and unapologetically rooted in racism. In the wake of the Cold War’s demise, Hollywood needed a new quarry. Enter: the “scummy Arab”. All the blockbuster movies of the time needed one. Not in the lead role, heavens above, no! The part of the shady henchman or callous thief had to suffice.

Skip a bath, and snarl a few phlegmy, guttural sounds out and you, my friend, fit the mould.

The message was unsubtle: it’s them and us. Civilised and savage. In a society still reliant on pointing a finger at funny foreigners to assert its supremacy, Arabs and Muslims were undeniably fair game. Where did I fit in?

~~~~~~~~~~

I’m finding this pretty cathartic, but capturing and articulating a lived experience like mine is difficult. The memories remain vivid, but the effects are nebulous. You simply live it day to day. Sometimes, you forget it’s even there.

In truth, the briefest of encounters and incidents tend to have augmented my sense of otherness the most:

The times a total lack of effort to pronounce my (eminently easy) name led to a jovial: “I’ll call you Mark. That OK, mate?”

“Actually no, how about you make a f*****g effort, ‘mate’?”.. I’d imagine replying, wishing I could set down my agreeable nature for a moment!

“Perhaps you could change your name to Martin Jones?” a family friend suggested, pragmatically. “The one you have might put off prospective employers”

“I bet you’re with MI6.. are you a spy?” Half-joked a girlfriend’s mother.

Small, ephemeral nicks in my life story. But I still feel them, viscerally.

Bristle, and you’re being a stick-in-the-mud. Absorb, and the weight on your shoulders can deform who you are around them.

~~~~~~~~~~

Above all, i feel it’s an appropriate time to talk about this. I want to add my voice to those of others who’ve bravely preceded me, suffering far more than I ever have.

In some ways, people are now freer than ever to express their own truths, and revel in their own fluid identities. That’s one thing I love about living in 21st century Britain.

There’s always a flip side, however.... others who watch on with simmering discontent at a world inaccurately portrayed to them, moving forward far too quickly. Agenda-driven politics and tribalism is gathering momentum, shouting the loudest, as it always does.

Assaulted by relentless opinion pieces disguised as facts, with news polarising opinion for profit, we’re slowly being split; manipulated into embittered, isolated factions.

In recent times, Brexit, Boris and the embers of the Trump wildfire have been too easy to dismiss as the manifestations of a lunatic fringe. In reality, they represented a lot of disenfranchised people, who haven’t gone away. They can’t, and shouldn’t be ignored.

People like me and my children will be the norm in the future. It’s inevitable; a gradual genetic melding as the world continues to open up. There’s every reason to embrace the benefits, casting resentments and assumptions aside in favour of listening, really listening to each other. Seeking common ground. The world has far bigger global issues to divert its collective attentions to, after all.

I think the struggle may continue for me, perhaps forever. It’s too ingrained. It’ll morph and evolve, and I’ll keep learning to live with it. I’ll keep you posted if I’ve any sudden revelations or breakthroughs!

That said, I choose to believe the future’s bright. When my kids aren’t gleefully practising their “shakoo maakoo” with their Jiddu (grandfather), they’re belting out Christmas songs for their nativity plays with their friends. All of it makes sense to them. Why wouldn’t it?

My inspirational little genetic jumbles just being; living. Exactly as it should be.