The Penguin Book of Migration Literature

by Dohra Ahmad

  He had explained patiently that for years he had worked more than ten hours a day, had few enjoyments or hobbies and never went on holiday. Surely it wasn’t a crime to have a drink when he wanted one?

  ‘But it is forbidden,’ the boy said.

  Parvez shrugged, ‘I know.’

  ‘And so is gambling, isn’t it?’

  ‘Yes. But surely we are only human?’

  Each time Parvez took a drink, the boy made, as an accompaniment, some kind of wince or fastidious face. This made Parvez drink more quickly. The waiter, wanting to please his friend, brought another glass of whisky. Parvez knew he was getting drunk, but he couldn’t stop himself. Ali had a horrible look, full of disgust and censure. It was as if he hated his father.

  Halfway through the meal Parvez suddenly lost his temper and threw a plate on the floor. He felt like ripping the cloth from the table, but the waiters and other customers were staring at him. Yet he wouldn’t stand for his own son telling him the difference between right and wrong. He knew he wasn’t a bad man. He had a conscience. There were a few things of which he was ashamed, but on the whole he had lived a decent life.

  ‘When have I had time to be wicked?’ he told Ali.

  In a low monotonous voice the boy explained that Parvez had not, in fact, lived a good life. He had broken countless rules of the Koran.

  ‘For instance?’ Parvez demanded.

  Ali didn’t need to think. As if he had been waiting for this moment, he asked his father if he didn’t relish pork pies.

  ‘Well?’

  Parvez couldn’t deny that he loved crispy bacon smothered with mushrooms and mustard and sandwiched between slices of fried bread. In fact he ate this for breakfast every morning.

  Ali then reminded him that Parvez had ordered his own wife to cook pork sausages, saying to her, ‘You’re not in the village now, this is England. We have to fit in!’

  Parvez was so annoyed and perplexed by this attack that he called for more drink.

  ‘The problem is this,’ the boy said. He leaned across the table. For the first time that night his eyes were alive. ‘You are too implicated in Western civilisation.’

  Parvez burped; he thought he was going to choke. ‘Implicated!’ he said. ‘But we live here!’

  ‘The Western materialists hate us,’ Ali said. ‘Papa, how can you love something which hates you?’

  ‘What is the answer then?’ Parvez said miserably, ‘According to you.’

  Ali addressed his father fluently, as if Parvez were a rowdy crowd that had to be quelled and convinced. The Law of Islam would rule the world; the skin of the infidel would burn off again and again; the Jews and Christers would be routed. The West was a sink of hypocrites, adulterers, homosexuals, drug takers and prostitutes.

  As Ali talked, Parvez looked out of the window as if to check that they were still in London.

  ‘My people have taken enough. If the persecution doesn’t stop there will be jihad. I, and millions of others, will gladly give our lives for the cause.’

  ‘But why, why?’ Parvez said.

  ‘For us the reward will be in paradise.’

  ‘Paradise!’

  Finally, as Parvez’s eyes filled with tears, the boy urged him to mend his ways.

  ‘How is that possible?’ Parvez asked.

  ‘Pray,’ said Ali. ‘Pray beside me.’

  Parvez called for the bill and ushered his boy out of there as soon as he was able. He couldn’t take any more. Ali sounded as if he’d swallowed someone else’s voice.

  On the way home the boy sat in the back of the taxi as if he were a customer.

  ‘What has made you like this?’ Parvez asked him, afraid that somehow he was to blame for all this. ‘Is there a particular event which has influenced you?’

  ‘Living in this country.’

  ‘But I love England,’ Parvez said, watching his boy in the mirror. ‘They let you do almost anything here.’

  ‘That is the problem,’ he replied.

  For the first time in years Parvez couldn’t see straight. He knocked the side of the car against a lorry, ripping off the wing mirror. They were lucky not to have been stopped by the police: Parvez would have lost his licence and therefore his job.

  Getting out of the car back at the house, Parvez stumbled and fell in the road, scraping his hands and ripping his trousers. He managed to haul himself up. The boy didn’t even offer him his hand.

  Parvez told Bettina he was willing to pray, if that was what the boy wanted, if it would dislodge the pitiless look from his eyes.

  ‘But what I object to,’ he said, ‘is being told by my own son that I am going to hell!’

  What finished Parvez off was that the boy had said he was giving up accountancy. When Parvez had asked why, Ali said sarcastically that it was obvious.

  ‘Western education cultivates an anti-religious attitude.’

  And, according to Ali, in the world of accountants it was usual to meet women, drink alcohol and practise usury.

  ‘But it’s well-paid work,’ Parvez argued. ‘For years you’ve been preparing!’

  Ali said he was going to begin to work in prisons, with poor Muslims who were struggling to maintain their purity in the face of corruption. Finally, at the end of the evening, as Ali went up to bed, he had asked his father why he didn’t have a beard, or at least a moustache.

  ‘I feel as if I’ve lost my son,’ Parvez told Bettina. ‘I can’t bear to be looked at as if I’m a criminal. I’ve decided what to do.’

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘I’m going to tell him to pick up his prayer mat and get out of my house. It will be the hardest thing I’ve ever done, but tonight I’m going to do it.’

  ‘But you mustn’t give up on him,’ said Bettina. ‘Many young people fall into cults and superstitious groups. It doesn’t mean they’ll always feel the same way.’

  She said Parvez had to stick by his boy, giving him support, until he came through.

  Parvez was persuaded that she was right, even though he didn’t feel like giving his son more love when he had hardly been thanked for all he had already given.

  Nevertheless, Parvez tried to endure his son’s looks and reproaches. He attempted to make conversation about his beliefs. But if Parvez ventured any criticism, Ali always had a brusque reply. On one occasion Ali accused Parvez of ‘grovelling’ to the whites; in contrast, he explained, he was not ‘inferior’; there was more to the world than the West, though the West always thought it was best.

  ‘How is it you know that,’ Parvez said, ‘seeing as you’ve never left England?’

  Ali replied with a look of contempt.

  One night, having ensured there was no alcohol on his breath, Parvez sat down at the kitchen table with Ali. He hoped Ali would compliment him on the beard he was growing but Ali didn’t appear to notice.

  The previous day Parvez had been telling Bettina that he thought people in the West sometimes felt inwardly empty and that people needed a philosophy to live by.

  ‘Yes,’ said Bettina. ‘That’s the answer. You must tell him what your philosophy of life is. Then he will understand that there are other beliefs.’

  After some fatiguing consideration, Parvez was ready to begin. The boy watched him as if he expected nothing.

  Haltingly Parvez said that people had to treat one another with respect, particularly children their parents. This did seem, for a moment, to affect the boy. Heartened, Parvez continued. In his view this life was all there was and when you died you rotted in the earth. ‘Grass and flowers will grow out of me, but something of me will live on.’

  ‘How?’

  ‘In other people. I will continue—in you.’ At this the boy appeared a little distressed.

  ‘And your grandchildren,’ Parvez added for good measure. ‘But while I am her
e on earth I want to make the best of it. And I want you to, as well!’

  ‘What d’you mean by “make the best of it”?’ asked the boy.

  ‘Well,’ said Parvez. ‘For a start . . . you should enjoy yourself. Yes. Enjoy yourself without hurting others.’

  Ali said enjoyment was a ‘bottomless pit’.

  ‘But I don’t mean enjoyment like that!’ said Parvez. ‘I mean the beauty of living!’

  ‘All over the world our people are oppressed,’ was the boy’s reply.

  ‘I know,’ Parvez replied, not entirely sure who ‘our people’ were, ‘but still life is for living!’

  Ali said, ‘Real morality has existed for hundreds of years. Around the world millions and millions of people share my beliefs. Are you saying you are right and they are all wrong?’

  Ali looked at his father with such aggressive confidence that Parvez could say no more.

  One evening Bettina was sitting in Parvez’s car, after visiting a client, when they passed a boy on the street.

  ‘That’s my son,’ Parvez said suddenly. They were on the other side of town, in a poor district, where there were two mosques.

  Parvez set his face hard.

  Bettina turned to watch him. ‘Slow down then, slow down!’ She said, ‘He’s good-looking. Reminds me of you. But with a more determined face. Please, can’t we stop?’

  ‘What for?’

  ‘I’d like to talk to him.’

  Parvez turned the cab round and stopped beside the boy.

  ‘Coming home?’ Parvez asked. ‘It’s quite a way.’

  The sullen boy shrugged and got into the back seat. Bettina sat in the front. Parvez became aware of Bettina’s short skirt, gaudy rings and ice-blue eye-shadow. He became conscious that the smell of her perfume, which he loved, filled the cab. He opened the window.

  While Parvez drove as fast as he could, Bettina said gently to Ali, ‘Where have you been?’

  ‘The mosque,’ he said.

  ‘And how are you getting on at college? Are you working hard?’

  ‘Who are you to ask me these questions?’ he said, looking out of the window. Then they hit bad traffic and the car came to a standstill.

  By now Bettina had inadvertently laid her hand on Parvez’s shoulder. She said, ‘Your father, who is a good man, is very worried about you. You know he loves you more than his own life.’

  ‘You say he loves me,’ the boy said.

  ‘Yes!’ said Bettina.

  ‘Then why is he letting a woman like you touch him like that?’

  If Bettina looked at the boy in anger, he looked back at her with twice as much cold fury.

  She said, ‘What kind of woman am I that deserves to be spoken to like that?’

  ‘You know,’ he said. ‘Now let me out.’

  ‘Never,’ Parvez replied.

  ‘Don’t worry, I’m getting out,’ Bettina said.

  ‘No, don’t!’ said Parvez. But even as the car moved she opened the door, threw herself out and ran away across the road. Parvez shouted after her, several times called after her, but she had gone.

  Parvez took Ali back to the house, saying nothing more to him. Ali went straight to his room. Parvez was unable to read the paper, watch television or even sit down. He kept pouring himself drinks.

  At last he went upstairs and paced up and down outside Ali’s room. When, finally, he opened the door, Ali was praying. The boy didn’t even glance his way.

  Parvez kicked him over. Then he dragged the boy up by his shirt and hit him. The boy fell back. Parvez hit him again. The boy’s face was bloody. Parvez was panting, he knew the boy was unreachable, but he struck him nonetheless. The boy neither covered himself nor retaliated; there was no fear in his eyes. He only said, through his split lip: ‘So who’s the fanatic now?’

  ZADIE SMITH

  From

  WHITE TEETH

  There was a lamppost, equidistant from the Jones house and Glenard Oak Comprehensive, that had begun to appear in Irie’s dreams. Not the lamppost exactly, but a small, handmade ad that was taped round its girth at eye level. It said:

  LOSE WEIGHT TO EARN MONEY

  081 555 6752

  Now, Irie Jones, aged fifteen, was big. The European proportions of Clara’s figure had skipped a generation, and she was landed instead with Hortense’s substantial Jamaican frame, loaded with pineapples, mangoes, and guavas; the girl had weight; big tits, big butt, big hips, big thighs, big teeth. She was 182 pounds and had thirteen pounds in her savings account. She knew she was the target audience (if ever there was one), she knew full well, as she trudged schoolward, mouth full of doughnut, hugging her spare tires, that the ad was speaking to her. It was speaking to her. LOSE WEIGHT (it was saying) TO EARN MONEY. You, you, you, Miss Jones, with your strategically placed arms and cardigan, tied around the arse (the endless mystery: how to diminish that swollen enormity, the Jamaican posterior?), with your belly-reducing panties and breast-reducing bra, with your meticulous Lycra corseting—the much-lauded nineties answer to whalebone—with your elasticized waists. She knew the ad was talking to her. But she didn’t know quite what it was saying. What were we talking about here? Sponsored slim? The earning capacity of thin people? Or something altogether more Jacobean, the brainchild of some sordid Willesden Shylock, a pound of flesh for a pound of gold: meat for money?

  Rapid. Eye. Movement. Sometimes she’d be walking through school in a bikini with the lamppost enigma written in chalk over her brown bulges, over her various ledges (shelf space for books, cups of tea, baskets, or, more to the point, children, bags of fruit, buckets of water), ledges genetically designed with another country in mind, another climate. Other times, the sponsored slim dream: knocking on door after door, butt-naked with a clipboard, drenched in sunlight, trying to encourage old men to pinch-an-inch and pledge-a-pound. Worst times? Tearing off loose, white-flecked flesh and packing it into those old curvaceous Coke bottles; she is carrying them to the corner shop, passing them over a counter; and Millat is the bindi-wearing, V-necked shopkeeper, he is adding them up, grudgingly opening the till with blood-stained paws, handing over the cash. A little Caribbean flesh for a little English change.

  Irie Jones was obsessed. Occasionally her worried mother cornered her in the hallway before she slunk out of the door, picked at her elaborate corsetry, asked, “What’s up with you? What in the Lord’s name are you wearing? How can you breathe? Irie, my love, you’re fine—you’re just built like an honest-to-God Bowden—don’t you know you’re fine?”

  But Irie didn’t know she was fine. There was England, a gigantic mirror, and there was Irie, without reflection. A stranger in a stranger land.

  Nightmares and daydreams, on the bus, in the bath, in class. Before. After. Before. After. Before. After. The mantra of the makeover junkie, sucking it in, letting it out; unwilling to settle for genetic fate; waiting instead for her transformation from Jamaican hourglass heavy with the sands that gather round Dunns River Falls, to English Rose—oh, you know her—she’s a slender, delicate thing not made for the hot sun, a surfboard rippled by the wave:

  Mrs. Olive Roody, English teacher and expert doodle-spotter at distances of up to twenty yards, reached over her desk to Irie’s notebook and tore out the piece of paper in question. Looked dubiously at it. Then inquired with melodious Scottish emphasis, “Before and after what?”

  “Er . . . what?”

  “Before and after what?”

  “Oh. Nothing, miss.”

  “Nothing? Oh, come now, Ms. Jones. No need for modesty. It is obviously more interesting than Sonnet 127.”

  “Nothing. It’s nothing.”

  “Absolutely certain? You don’t wish to delay the class anymore? Because . . . some of the class need to listen to—are even a wee bit interested in—what I have to say. So if you could spare some time from your doo
oodling—”

  No one but no one said “doodling” like Olive Roody.

  “—and join the rest of us, we’ll continue. Well?”

  “Well what?”

  “Can you? Spare the time?”

  “Yes, Mrs. Roody.”

  “Oh, good. That’s cheered me up. Sonnet 127, please.”

  “In the old age black was not counted fair,” continued Francis Stone in the catatonic drone with which students read Elizabethan verse. “Or if it were, it bore not beauty’s name.”

  Irie put her right hand on her stomach, sucked in, and tried to catch Millat’s eye. But Millat was busy showing pretty Nikki Tyler how he could manipulate his tongue into a narrow roll, a flute. Nikki Tyler was showing him how the lobes of her ears were attached to the side of her head rather than loose. Flirtatious remnants of this morning’s science lesson: Inherited characteristics. Part One (a). Loose. Attached. Rolled. Flat. Blue eye. Brown eye. Before. After.

  “Therefore my mistress’ eyes are raven black, her brows so suited, and they mourners seem . . . My mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun; Coral is far more red than her lips’ red. If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun . . .”

  Puberty, real full-blown puberty (not the slight mound of a breast, or the shadowy emergence of fuzz), had separated these old friends, Irie Jones and Millat Iqbal. Different sides of the school fence. Irie believed she had been dealt the dodgy cards: mountainous curves, buckteeth and thick metal retainer, impossible Afro hair, and to top it off mole-ish eyesight that in turn required Coke-bottle spectacles in a light shade of pink. (Even those blue eyes—the eyes Archie had been so excited about—lasted two weeks only. She had been born with them, yes, but one day Clara looked again and there were brown eyes staring up at her, like the transition between a closed bud and an open flower, the exact moment of which the naked, waiting eye can never detect.) And this belief in her ugliness, in her wrongness, had subdued her; she kept her smart-ass comments to herself these days, she kept her right hand on her stomach. She was all wrong.