September 5th 2023.
My father remains my source of inspiration. I have a vivid childhood memory of visiting Bangladesh, and seeing an old man with one leg, using crutches to move around. Being a kid, I had no understanding of his condition, so I took his stick from him and tried to imitate his walking. My father, seeing all this, immediately apologised to him and then provided him with a meal.
Later that day, my father took me aside and talked to me about understanding the situations of those less fortunate than us. I was around 10 years old at that time and my family and I had moved to the UK a few years prior to that. It was an eye-opening experience.
My father has done so much for my family and me, and I look up to him for that. He arrived in the UK in 1962 at the age of 17, via a commonwealth employment voucher. His plan was to set up a life here and then bring us over to join him. His first years in the UK were full of hardship. He earned £4 pounds and eight shillings a week, working as 'the dishwasher' in an Italian restaurant in London. He also had to share a single room with four other men, and sometimes even sleep on the Tube to keep warm.
However, with all his hard work, he was able to save up and start his own curry restaurant in Brixton. This enabled us to join my father in 1973, when I was five years old. I still remember the first day we arrived in London. I walked into a flat in King’s Cross, with a bathtub doubling as a dining table in the kitchen. I was captivated to witness a black and white TV for the first time.
Curry houses were very popular back then and I would often hear customers ordering food with an imitating Indian accent. My father never got bothered by this and was always courteous and helpful. He had this extraordinary ability to make anyone feel special. He has six children and eleven grandchildren.
Unfortunately, the conditions of poor housing, combined with the recession and police discrimination, led to the Brixton Riots. My father had closed his restaurant during the riots, and upon his return, he found it looted and vandalised, with broken windows.
I attended the local comprehensive school in Fulham, and though I have fond memories, I also experienced racism. I felt that I had to downplay my own identity and assimilate in order to be more 'British', such as not attending mosque on the weekends. I was lucky to have good friends around me and I eventually started doing well at school.
My father was always busy, working seven days a week, but the times that I did spend with him, I felt nothing was impossible. He would always instil a sense of confidence in me, and it felt like the Bible. His encouragement enabled me to believe that I could pursue higher education, even though nobody in the family had ever been to university before.
I worked hard to get my O-levels, followed by my A-levels at Dulwich College. I eventually got into medical school, and to make ends meet, I did several jobs, such as delivering pizza, working as a DJ and as a youth worker, all while studying.
My dad has always been and still is my inspiration. When I was a 10 year old kid, we were visiting Bangladesh after my family had moved to the UK a few years prior. On that day, I saw an old man who only had one leg and he was using a pair of crutches. Without understanding or appreciating his situation, I took his stick and started to imitate his walking.
My father noticed and immediately apologized to him, then he sat him down and gave him a meal. Later that day, he took me aside and taught me how to see through the eyes of others less fortunate than me. It was a truly humbling experience that has stayed with me throughout my life.
My father made a lot of sacrifices for my family and I. He arrived in the UK at the age of 17 in 1962 via a commonwealth employment voucher, in the hopes of creating a better life for us. His first few years in the UK were hard, he would make £4 pounds and eight shillings a week as a dishwasher in an Italian restaurant in London, and sometimes he would sleep on the tube to keep warm.
However, through hard work and dedication, he was able to save and earn enough to start his own curry restaurant in Brixton, and eventually opened several others. His success enabled my mother, sister and myself to come over in 1973, when I was five years old, and join him in London.
My father was a very kind and generous man, he had the ability to make anyone feel special. He always believed in me and instilled a seed of confidence in me that I could achieve anything, this became my life motto. I ended up working hard and got accepted in medical school, even though there was nobody else in my family who had attended university.
I remember the time during the Brixton Riots, when my father's shop was burned and looted, with broken windows. I also faced a lot of racism in school, which made me try to assimilate and downplay a lot of my own identity. But I had my father's encouragement and it was this that helped me to keep going and never give up on my dreams.
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