The Son of a difficult father: Colin Grant at TEDxBrighton
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0:06 - 0:08This is a photograph
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0:08 - 0:10of a man whom for many years
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0:10 - 0:14I plotted to kill.
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0:14 - 0:17This is my father,
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0:17 - 0:21Clinton George "Bageye" Grant.
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0:21 - 0:23He's called Bageye because he has
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0:23 - 0:27permanent bags under his eyes.
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0:27 - 0:30As a 10-year-old, along with my siblings,
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0:30 - 0:34I dreamt of scraping off the poison
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0:34 - 0:38from fly-killer paper into his coffee,
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0:38 - 0:40grounded down glass and sprinkling it
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0:40 - 0:43over his breakfast,
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0:43 - 0:45loosening the carpet on the stairs
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0:45 - 0:48so he would trip and break his neck.
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0:48 - 0:50But come the day, he would always
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0:50 - 0:52skip that loose step,
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0:52 - 0:54he would always bow out of the house
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0:54 - 0:56without so much as a swig of coffee
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0:56 - 0:59or a bite to eat.
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0:59 - 1:00And so for many years,
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1:00 - 1:02I feared that my father would die
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1:02 - 1:04before I had a chance to kill him.
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1:04 - 1:09(Laughter)
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1:09 - 1:12Up until our mother asked him to leave
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1:12 - 1:13and not come back,
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1:13 - 1:18Bageye had been a terrifying ogre.
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1:18 - 1:21He teetered permanently on the verge of rage,
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1:21 - 1:25rather like me, as you see.
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1:25 - 1:28He worked nights at Vauxhall Motors in Luton
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1:28 - 1:31and demanded total silence throughout the house,
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1:31 - 1:34so that when we came home from school
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1:34 - 1:36at 3:30 in the afternoon, we would huddle
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1:36 - 1:39beside the TV, and rather like safe-crackers,
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1:39 - 1:42we would twiddle with the volume control knob
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1:42 - 1:44on the TV so it was almost inaudible.
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1:44 - 1:47And at times, when we were like this,
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1:47 - 1:49so much "Shhh," so much "Shhh"
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1:49 - 1:51going on in the house
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1:51 - 1:53that I imagined us to be like
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1:53 - 1:57the German crew of a U-boat
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1:57 - 1:59creeping along the edge of the ocean
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1:59 - 2:01whilst up above, on the surface,
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2:01 - 2:05HMS Bageye patrolled
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2:05 - 2:07ready to drop death charges
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2:07 - 2:11at the first sound of any disturbance.
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2:11 - 2:14So that lesson was the lesson that
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2:14 - 2:15"Do not draw attention to yourself
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2:15 - 2:17either in the home or outside of the home."
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2:17 - 2:20Maybe it's a migrant lesson.
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2:20 - 2:23We were to be below the radar,
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2:23 - 2:25so there was no communication, really,
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2:25 - 2:28between Bageye and us and us and Bageye,
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2:28 - 2:30and the sound that we most looked forward to,
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2:30 - 2:32you know when you're a child and you want
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2:32 - 2:36your father to come homeand it's all going to be happy
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2:36 - 2:37and you're waiting for that sound of the door opening.
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2:37 - 2:39Well the sound that we looked forward to
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2:39 - 2:41was the click of the door closing,
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2:41 - 2:45which meant he'd gone and would not come back.
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2:45 - 2:49So for three decades,
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2:49 - 2:52I never laid eyes on my father, nor he on me.
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2:52 - 2:54We never spoke to each other for three decades,
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2:54 - 2:55and then a couple of years ago, I decided
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2:55 - 3:00to turn the spotlight on him.
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3:00 - 3:01"You are being watched.
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3:01 - 3:03Actually, you are.
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3:03 - 3:05You are being watched."
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3:05 - 3:08That was his mantra to us, his children.
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3:08 - 3:10Time and time again he would say this to us.
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3:10 - 3:13And this was the 1970s, it was Luton,
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3:13 - 3:14where he worked at Vauxhall Motors,
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3:14 - 3:16and he was a Jamaican.
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3:16 - 3:17And what he meant was,
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3:17 - 3:19you as a child of a Jamaican immigrant
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3:19 - 3:21are being watched
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3:21 - 3:23to see which way you turn, to see whether
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3:23 - 3:27you conform to the host nation's stereotype of you,
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3:27 - 3:30of being feckless, work-shy,
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3:30 - 3:32destined for a life of crime.
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3:32 - 3:34You are being watched,
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3:34 - 3:38so confound their expectations of you.
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3:38 - 3:43To that end, Bageye and his friends,
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3:43 - 3:44mostly Jamaican,
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3:44 - 3:48exhibited a kind of Jamaican bella figura:
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3:48 - 3:51Turn your best side to the world,
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3:51 - 3:53show your best face to the world.
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3:53 - 3:55If you have seen some of the images
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3:55 - 3:57of the Caribbean people arriving
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3:57 - 3:59in the '40s and '50s,
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3:59 - 4:00you might have noticed that a lot of the men
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4:00 - 4:02wear trilbies.
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4:02 - 4:05Now, there was no traditionof wearing trilbies in Jamaica.
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4:05 - 4:08They invented that tradition for their arrival here.
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4:08 - 4:10They wanted to project themselves in a way
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4:10 - 4:12that they wanted to be perceived,
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4:12 - 4:14so that the way they looked
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4:14 - 4:17and the names that they gave themselves
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4:17 - 4:19defined them.
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4:19 - 4:24So Bageye is bald and has baggy eyes.
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4:24 - 4:28Tidy Boots is very fussy about his footwear.
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4:28 - 4:31Anxious is always anxious.
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4:31 - 4:33Clock has one arm longer than the other.
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4:33 - 4:37(Laughter)
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4:37 - 4:41And my all-time favorite was theguy they called Summerwear.
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4:41 - 4:42When Summerwear came to this country
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4:42 - 4:44from Jamaica in the early '60s, he insisted
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4:44 - 4:47on wearing light summer suits,
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4:47 - 4:48no matter the weather,
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4:48 - 4:50and in the course of researching their lives,
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4:50 - 4:53I asked my mom, "Whateverbecame of Summerwear?"
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4:53 - 4:58And she said, "He caught a cold and died." (Laughter)
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4:58 - 4:59But men like Summerwear
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4:59 - 5:01taught us the importance of style.
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5:01 - 5:03Maybe they exaggerated their style
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5:03 - 5:06because they thought that they were not considered
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5:06 - 5:08to be quite civilized,
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5:08 - 5:11and they transferred that generational attitude
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5:11 - 5:14or anxiety onto us, the next generation,
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5:14 - 5:16so much so that when I was growing up,
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5:16 - 5:18if ever on the television news or radio
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5:18 - 5:20a report came up about a black person
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5:20 - 5:22committing some crime —
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5:22 - 5:25a mugging, a murder, a burglary —
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5:25 - 5:29we winced along with our parents,
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5:29 - 5:31because they were letting the side down.
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5:31 - 5:33You did not just represent yourself.
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5:33 - 5:35You represented the group,
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5:35 - 5:39and it was a terrifying thing to come to terms with,
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5:39 - 5:41in a way, that maybe you were going
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5:41 - 5:46to be perceived in the same light.
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5:46 - 5:49So that was what needed to be challenged.
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5:49 - 5:54Our father and many of his colleagues
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5:54 - 5:57exhibited a kind of transmission but not receiving.
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5:57 - 5:59They were built to transmit but not receive.
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5:59 - 6:02We were to keep quiet.
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6:02 - 6:03When our father did speak to us,
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6:03 - 6:06it was from the pulpit of his mind.
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6:06 - 6:08They clung to certainty in the belief
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6:08 - 6:12that doubt would undermine them.
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6:12 - 6:16But when I am working in my house
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6:16 - 6:20and writing, after a day's writing, I rush downstairs
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6:20 - 6:23and I'm very excited to talk aboutMarcus Garvey or Bob Marley
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6:23 - 6:26and words are tripping out of my mouth like butterflies
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6:26 - 6:28and I'm so excited that my children stop me,
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6:28 - 6:32and they say, "Dad, nobody cares."
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6:32 - 6:36(Laughter)
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6:36 - 6:38But they do care, actually.
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6:38 - 6:39They cross over.
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6:39 - 6:42Somehow they find their way to you.
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6:42 - 6:45They shape their lives accordingto the narrative of your life,
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6:45 - 6:49as I did with my father and my mother, perhaps,
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6:49 - 6:52and maybe Bageye did with his father.
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6:52 - 6:54And that was clearer to me
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6:54 - 6:57in the course of looking at his life
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6:57 - 7:00and understanding, as they say,
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7:00 - 7:01the Native Americans say,
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7:01 - 7:03"Do not criticize the man until you can walk
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7:03 - 7:05in his moccasins."
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7:05 - 7:08But in conjuring his life, it was okay
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7:08 - 7:11and very straightforward to portray
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7:11 - 7:14a Caribbean life in England in the 1970s
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7:14 - 7:19with bowls of plastic fruit,
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7:19 - 7:22polystyrene ceiling tiles,
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7:22 - 7:24settees permanently sheathed
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7:24 - 7:28in their transparent coversthat they were delivered in.
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7:28 - 7:30But what's more difficult to navigate
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7:30 - 7:31is the emotional landscape
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7:31 - 7:33between the generations,
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7:33 - 7:38and the old adage that with age comes wisdom
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7:38 - 7:40is not true.
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7:40 - 7:43With age comes the veneer of respectability
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7:43 - 7:47and a veneer of uncomfortable truths.
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7:47 - 7:50But what was true was that my parents,
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7:50 - 7:52my mother, and my father went along with it,
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7:52 - 7:55did not trust the state to educate me.
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7:55 - 7:57So listen to how I sound.
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7:57 - 8:02They determined that they wouldsend me to a private school,
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8:02 - 8:03but my father worked at Vauxhall Motors.
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8:03 - 8:07It's quite difficult to fund a private school education
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8:07 - 8:10and feed his army of children.
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8:10 - 8:12I remember going on to the school
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8:12 - 8:14for the entrance exam, and my father said
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8:14 - 8:17to the priest — it was a Catholic school —
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8:17 - 8:22he wanted a better "heducation" for the boy,
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8:22 - 8:25but also, he, my father,
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8:25 - 8:27never even managed to pass worms,
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8:27 - 8:30never mind entrance exams.
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8:30 - 8:32But in order to fund my education,
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8:32 - 8:35he was going to have to do some dodgy stuff,
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8:35 - 8:38so my father would fund my education
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8:38 - 8:41by trading in illicit goods from the back of his car,
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8:41 - 8:43and that was made even more tricky because
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8:43 - 8:45my father, that's not his car by the way.
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8:45 - 8:47My father aspired to have a car like that,
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8:47 - 8:49but my father had a beaten-up Mini,
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8:49 - 8:53and he never, being aJamaican coming to this country,
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8:53 - 8:56he never had a driving license,
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8:56 - 8:59he never had any insurance or road tax or MOT.
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8:59 - 9:01He thought, "I know how to drive;
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9:01 - 9:04why do I need the state's validation?"
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9:04 - 9:06But it became a little tricky whenwe were stopped by the police,
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9:06 - 9:09and we were stopped a lot by the police,
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9:09 - 9:10and I was impressed by the way
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9:10 - 9:12that my father dealt with the police.
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9:12 - 9:15He would promote the policeman immediately,
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9:15 - 9:19so that P.C. Bloggs became Detective Inspector Bloggs
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9:19 - 9:20in the course of the conversation
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9:20 - 9:22and wave us on merrily.
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9:22 - 9:24So my father was exhibiting what we in Jamaica
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9:24 - 9:28called "playing fool to catch wise."
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9:28 - 9:31But it lent also an idea
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9:31 - 9:33that actually he was being diminished
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9:33 - 9:35or belittled by the policeman —
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9:35 - 9:37as a 10-year-old boy, I saw that —
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9:37 - 9:40but also there was an ambivalence towards authority.
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9:40 - 9:41So on the one hand, there was
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9:41 - 9:43a mocking of authority,
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9:43 - 9:45but on the other hand, there was a deference
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9:45 - 9:47towards authority,
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9:47 - 9:49and these Caribbean people
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9:49 - 9:53had an overbearing obedience towards authority,
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9:53 - 9:55which is very striking, very strange in a way,
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9:55 - 9:59because migrants are very courageous people.
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9:59 - 10:01They leave their homes. My father and my mother
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10:01 - 10:05left Jamaica and they traveled 4,000 miles,
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10:05 - 10:09and yet they were infantilized by travel.
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10:09 - 10:11They were timid,
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10:11 - 10:12and somewhere along the line,
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10:12 - 10:14the natural order was reversed.
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10:14 - 10:18The children became the parents to the parent.
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10:20 - 10:22The Caribbean people came tothis country with a five-year plan:
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10:22 - 10:24they would work, some money, and then go back,
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10:24 - 10:27but the five years became 10, the 10 became 15,
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10:27 - 10:29and before you know it,you're changing the wallpaper,
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10:29 - 10:33and at that point, you know you're here to stay.
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10:33 - 10:35Although there's still the kind of temporariness
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10:35 - 10:38that our parents felt about being here,
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10:38 - 10:42but we children knew that the game was up.
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10:42 - 10:45I think there was a feeling that
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10:45 - 10:50they would not be able to continue with the ideals
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10:50 - 10:52of the life that they expected.
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10:52 - 10:54The reality was very much different.
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10:54 - 10:56And also, that was true of the reality
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10:56 - 10:58of trying to educate me.
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10:58 - 11:02Having started the process,my father did not continue.
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11:02 - 11:04It was left to my mother to educate me,
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11:04 - 11:07and as George Lamming would say,
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11:07 - 11:11it was my mother who fathered me.
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11:11 - 11:13Even in his absence, that old mantra remained:
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11:13 - 11:15You are being watched.
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11:15 - 11:18But such ardent watchfulness can lead to anxiety,
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11:18 - 11:20so much so that years later, when I was investigating
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11:20 - 11:22why so many young black men
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11:22 - 11:24were diagnosed with schizophrenia,
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11:24 - 11:26six times more than they ought to be,
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11:26 - 11:30I was not surprised to hear the psychiatrist say,
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11:30 - 11:34"Black people are schooled in paranoia."
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11:34 - 11:38And I wonder what Bageye would make of that.
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11:38 - 11:40Now I also had a 10-year-old son,
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11:40 - 11:43and turned my attention to Bageye
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11:43 - 11:45and I went in search of him.
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11:45 - 11:48He was back in Luton, he was now 82,
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11:48 - 11:52and I hadn't seen him for 30-odd years,
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11:52 - 11:53and when he opened the door,
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11:53 - 11:57I saw this tiny little man with lambent, smiling eyes,
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11:57 - 12:00and he was smiling, and I'd never seen him smile.
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12:00 - 12:03I was very disconcerted by that.
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12:03 - 12:06But we sat down, and he hada Caribbean friend with him,
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12:06 - 12:08talking some old time talk,
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12:08 - 12:11and my father would look at me,
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12:11 - 12:12and he looked at me as if I would
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12:12 - 12:16miraculously disappear as I had arisen.
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12:16 - 12:18And he turned to his friend, and he said,
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12:18 - 12:21"This boy and me have a deep, deep connection,
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12:21 - 12:24deep, deep connection."
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12:24 - 12:26But I never felt that connection.
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12:26 - 12:28If there was a pulse, it was very weak
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12:28 - 12:31or hardly at all.
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12:31 - 12:33And I almost felt in the course of that reunion
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12:33 - 12:38that I was auditioning to be my father's son.
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12:38 - 12:40When the book came out,
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12:40 - 12:41it had fair reviews in the national papers,
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12:41 - 12:45but the paper of choice in Luton is not The Guardian,
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12:45 - 12:47it's the Luton News,
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12:47 - 12:51and the Luton News ran the headline about the book,
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12:51 - 12:56"The Book That May Heal a 32-Year-Old Rift."
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12:56 - 12:59And I understood that could also represent
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12:59 - 13:01the rift between one generation and the next,
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13:01 - 13:05between people like me and my father's generation,
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13:05 - 13:07but there's no tradition in Caribbean life
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13:07 - 13:10of memoirs or biographies.
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13:10 - 13:14It was a tradition that you didn'tchat about your business in public.
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13:14 - 13:18But I welcomed that title, and I thought actually, yes,
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13:18 - 13:20there is a possibility that this
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13:20 - 13:24will open up conversationsthat we'd never had before.
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13:24 - 13:29This will close the generation gap, perhaps.
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13:29 - 13:31This could be an instrument of repair.
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13:31 - 13:34And I even began to feel that this book
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13:34 - 13:36may be perceived by my father
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13:36 - 13:41as an act of filial devotion.
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13:41 - 13:44Poor, deluded fool.
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13:44 - 13:48Bageye was stung by what he perceived to be
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13:48 - 13:51the public airing of his shortcomings.
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13:51 - 13:54He was stung by my betrayal,
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13:54 - 13:56and he went to the newspapers the next day
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13:56 - 13:57and demanded a right of reply,
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13:57 - 14:00and he got it with the headline
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14:00 - 14:03"Bageye Bites Back."
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14:03 - 14:06And it was a coruscating account of my betrayal.
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14:06 - 14:09I was no son of his.
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14:09 - 14:11He recognized in his mind that his colors
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14:11 - 14:13had been dragged through themud, and he couldn't allow that.
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14:13 - 14:16He had to restore his dignity, and he did so,
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14:16 - 14:18and initially, although I was disappointed,
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14:18 - 14:20I grew to admire that stance.
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14:20 - 14:23There was still fire bubbling through his veins,
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14:23 - 14:27even though he was 82 years old.
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14:27 - 14:29And if it meant that we would now return
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14:29 - 14:33to 30 years of silence,
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14:33 - 14:39my father would say, "If it's so, then it's so."
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14:39 - 14:42Jamaicans will tell you thatthere's no such thing as facts,
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14:42 - 14:44there are only versions.
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14:44 - 14:46We all tell ourselves the versions of the story
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14:46 - 14:49that we can best live with.
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14:49 - 14:52Each generation builds up an edifice
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14:52 - 14:54which they are reluctant or sometimes unable
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14:54 - 14:56to disassemble,
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14:56 - 15:00but in the writing, my version of the story
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15:00 - 15:02began to change,
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15:02 - 15:06and it was detached from me.
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15:06 - 15:09I lost my hatred of my father.
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15:09 - 15:13I did no longer want him to die or to murder him,
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15:13 - 15:17and I felt free,
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15:17 - 15:22much freer than I'd ever felt before.
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15:22 - 15:24And I wonder whether that freedness
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15:24 - 15:27could be transferred to him.
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15:29 - 15:33In that initial reunion,
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15:33 - 15:36I was struck by an idea that I had
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15:36 - 15:39very few photographs of myself
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15:39 - 15:42as a young child.
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15:42 - 15:44This is a photograph of me,
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15:44 - 15:46nine months old.
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15:46 - 15:48In the original photograph,
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15:48 - 15:51I'm being held up by my father, Bageye,
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15:51 - 15:53but when my parents separated, my mother
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15:53 - 15:56excised him from all aspects of our lives.
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15:56 - 16:00She took a pair of scissors and cut him out of every photograph,
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16:00 - 16:04and for years, I told myselfthe truth of this photograph
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16:04 - 16:07was that you are alone,
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16:07 - 16:09you are unsupported.
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16:09 - 16:12But there's another way of looking at this photograph.
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16:12 - 16:14This is a photograph that has the potential
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16:14 - 16:17for a reunion,
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16:17 - 16:20a potential to be reunited with my father,
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16:20 - 16:24and in my yearning to be held up by my father,
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16:24 - 16:26I held him up to the light.
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16:26 - 16:29In that first reunion,
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16:29 - 16:31it was very awkward and tense moments,
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16:31 - 16:33and to lessen the tension,
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16:33 - 16:36we decided to go for a walk.
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16:36 - 16:38And as we walked, I was struck
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16:38 - 16:40that I had reverted to being the child
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16:40 - 16:44even though I was now towering above my father.
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16:44 - 16:46I was almost a foot taller than my father.
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16:46 - 16:49He was still the big man,
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16:49 - 16:53and I tried to match his step.
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16:53 - 16:55And I realized that he was walking
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16:55 - 16:58as if he was still under observation,
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16:58 - 17:01but I admired his walk.
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17:01 - 17:03He walked like a man
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17:03 - 17:06on the losing side of the F.A. Cup Final
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17:06 - 17:10mounting the steps to collect his condolence medal.
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17:10 - 17:13There was dignity in defeat.
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17:13 - 17:16Thank you.
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17:16 - 17:17(Applause)
- Title:
- The Son of a difficult father: Colin Grant at TEDxBrighton
- Description:
-
Colin Grant is an author, historian and BBC radio producer; he has also worked as a script editor and produced several radio drama-documentaries. His talk discusses how he attempted to bridge the void between him and his father, through writing a memoir, failed; but taught him more about the vast experiential and cultural gaps between immigrants and their native children.
In the spirit of ideas worth spreading, TEDx is a program of local, self-organized events that bring people together to share a TED-like experience. At a TEDx event, TEDTalks video and live speakers combine to spark deep discussion and connection in a small group. These local, self-organized events are branded TEDx, where x = independently organized TED event. The TED Conference provides general guidance for the TEDx program, but individual TEDx events are self-organized.* (*Subject to certain rules and regulations)
- Video Language:
- English
- Team:
- closed TED
- Project:
- TEDxTalks
- Duration:
- 17:45
Ivana Korom edited English subtitles for Under Bageye's Watchful Eye: Colin Grant at TEDxBrighton | ||
Ivana Korom edited English subtitles for Under Bageye's Watchful Eye: Colin Grant at TEDxBrighton | ||
Ivana Korom edited English subtitles for Under Bageye's Watchful Eye: Colin Grant at TEDxBrighton | ||
Ivana Korom edited English subtitles for Under Bageye's Watchful Eye: Colin Grant at TEDxBrighton | ||
Ivana Korom edited English subtitles for Under Bageye's Watchful Eye: Colin Grant at TEDxBrighton | ||
Ivana Korom edited English subtitles for Under Bageye's Watchful Eye: Colin Grant at TEDxBrighton | ||
Ivana Korom edited English subtitles for Under Bageye's Watchful Eye: Colin Grant at TEDxBrighton | ||
Erica Junghans edited English subtitles for Under Bageye's Watchful Eye: Colin Grant at TEDxBrighton |