Miss Shelina Allibhai and Mr. Mehboob Allibhai: Welsh Asian Heritage Project

 

Farah Allibhai  00:02

Farah Allibhai interviewing Miss Shelina Allibhai  and Mr. Mehboob Allibhai on the seventh of April 2024.

 

Shelina Allibhai  00:13

Shelina Allibhai born 19th of April 1965. In Nairobi, Kenya, and grew up in Uganda before I came to the UK in 1972.

 

Mehboob Allibhai  00:27

Mehboob Allibhai born in 1963 in Uganda, Kampala. Grew up as part of my childhood in Uganda. Came to the UK in ‘72 after the expulsions of Asians by Idi Amin, and have been in Cardiff or the UK since. 

 

Farah Allibhai  00:50

So can you tell me a bit about your memories of Uganda?

 

Mehboob Allibhai  00:57

Okay, so I'm guessing I was about three, two and a half to three, and we were living in a place called Kikwanda. Shel must have been about a year and a half, and my first memory from there was of an earthquake. Our parents had gone to visit neighbours, and we were being babysitted by the house maid. We were then cowering under a table, the three of us when the earthquake took place. My next memory from Kikwanda was facing my sister, Shel, in the passenger seat, and I sat in the driver's side. The car, which was a Volkswagen Beetle, was on a slope which led to a road, and I released the handbrake and freewheeled the car onto the main road, not a main road as you would expect, tarmac, a dirt road. My third memory from those days was driving back as a family and my father hit a rock on the road, and that's Kikwanda, and that would have been between anywhere between two and a half to three and a half. I'm not sure if you remember any of that, Shel.

 

 

Shelina Allibhai  02:37

I don't have those recollections. We didn't live with our parents due to schooling. My recollection of staying with my mum's aunt in Kampala, I found that very difficult. I remember I cried a lot because I felt that I'd been left. However, it wasn't as terrible once we understood what was happening. Parents used to visit every other week. We used to go with mum on Saturdays to the Ladybird shop, buy books. We'd buy coconut macaroons and go and see my mum's other auntie. That's a memory I have. Also remember going back to Kikwanda for holidays, usually with drive, there'd be very long drives, although probably distance was probably similar from here to London, maybe a little bit further. But in those days, it took a lot, lot longer because of dirt roads.

 

Farah Allibhai  03:47

So at what age did your mother drop you off at your aunts? And why did she do that? And where were you before that? 

 

Shelina Allibhai  03:53

Probably I was probably about three years old. There were no real schools in Kikwanda, it was a very remote village, so parents thought, it was felt it was best for us to live in the city with families so that we could get the necessary schooling. So I was in nursery school, Mebs was already there probably the year before, and I went, and we both went to the Aga Khan school in Kampala.

 

Mehboob Allibhai  04:29

Okay, so I can't remember being on my own in Kampala while schooling, and need to put some context here, because Uganda was an ex British colony, so it had an education system that was very similar to the one in the UK, and principally the only creditable school was the Aga Khan school. I remember when Shel and I grew up there between probably the ages of four to eight and a half in my case. We used to live a little on top of a hill, approximately 10-15, minutes walk from school. We used to walk down the hill, cross a little stream or river, and we were there at school. At school, we used to have a uniform which was khaki trousers, white shirts, white socks, black shoes. Going to the Lady Bird shop was always a treat. Not only was it a Lady Bird's bookshop, but we used to wear ladybird clothing, if you can remember, and Clark shoes. I can remember we were immaculately dressed all the time. Activities in school, during the breaks, around the perimeter, which was a green fence. We used to have various vendors on the other side of the fence selling mango, raw mango, raw mangoes, but it would have salt and chili, and they would be sliced up there for you, or you could buy roasted corn on the cob and there was salted peanuts which were roasted as well. And I think I can always remember shillinggi, shillinggi, which is the currency, one shilling, which would have been about five pence, I'm guessing, in old money, and that was how much these things used to cost. So we always, obviously had money to go to school with. Class wise, I was taught by a Caucasian woman, I'm guessing she was from England. Her daughter was in my class, a taller than average girl compared to the rest of the class, blond hair in pigtails. I can recollect another person who was a year ahead, and I still know him, oddly enough. And I must have been about five, and we were doing a play, and I had to play somebody dead, was buried, and had a tree growing where he was buried. And I distinctly remember lying on the floor worrying about what I get told off for getting my shirt dirty and holding a one meter ruler on my chest, and I was commended for playing a very good dead tree, or dead person holding a tree. And when we got to school, there would be an assembly out in the yard, hundreds of children, hundreds and we would swear allegiance, do our morning prayer, and they will be disposed to our classrooms. Remember any of that? 

 

Shelina Allibhai

Yeah, I remember that 

 

Mehboob Allibhai

What colour was your uniform? 

 

Shelina Allibhai  08:36

I don't know. Gray. I don't know. I can't remember. 

 

Mehboob Allibhai  08:39

So girls used to wear a green pinafore and a white shirt, or T shirt, or something like that, white socks, black shoes. The other distinctive memory I have was the land surrounding my mum's aunt, who we used to call senior mum, had lots of shamba. A shamba is a crazy garden type, allotment type, with a little bit of bush. And I was fascinated with tadpoles. I thought they were amazing things. I'd never seen anything in the puddles or ponds, and always used to try and catch them at that house. I can remember a swing we used to have. There were motorbikes there because one of mum's cousin, Shillu, was an enthusiastic cyclist with motorbikes. At that house we had senior dad, senior mum, at one stage, three of their children, but Unnie, the daughter, went off to Kenya, I believe. Oh, now I found out that she went to Kenya to study art. We had Maji, who was the grand mother, and she was poorly.

 

Shelina Allibhai  10:22

She has a stroke, so she stayed in a darkened room most of the time.

 

Mehboob Allibhai  10:28

Every Sunday, without fail, we would be given a spoon of castor oil. 

 

Shelina Allibhai

A slice of orange

 

Mehboob Allibhai

A quarter of an orange and the weekend as a treat, again, was a whole fried egg. In the kitchen I can remember they used to brew tea. We didn't have electric kettles, obviously, but the tea was brewed, and it was a masala tea, so they would have this pot boiling milk, and they always used to put a piece of glass in there to raise the temperature and of the milk and so that he didn't also boil over. Next door was a Hindu family, do you remember that. Apparently, for some reason or another, we lived a very disciplined life. Very disciplined, please. Thank you. Those without saying, lying was totally, totally, utterly forbidden and punished, not a physical punishment in smacking, I can't remember being smacked, but we had to cross our hands, hold our ears and do multiple squats,

 

Shelina Allibhai  12:03

Depending on the offense. 

 

Mehboob Allibhai  12:07

I can especially remember doing 100 squat because I think Shel told an untruth, regarding the neighbour, and because the two houses were conjoined, the houses, the majority of houses in Kampala were bungalows, and it was always amazing to see somebody having a two story house, that that was some kind of status, or the anybody who lived above a shop. My grandmother, from my father's side, lived in Kampala as well. The name of the area escapes me, but it was behind shops, and she lived there with a couple of my uncles. Mom and dad lived in Kikwanda. Dad ran a business there. Kikwanda was 48 kilometres from Kampala, so I'm guessing that the journey was very long and arduous for Shelina because she was younger, and I had no perception, and I probably kept myself very occupied, and the time just flew. Do you remember where Ma lives? Kisinga.

 

Shelina Allibhai  13:38

I don't remember any of the names, but I recollect Auntie being very strict. We had a regime. Diet was very key. She was very health conscious. So we'd have soaked she'd soak sultanas in water, which she'd give us every day, and then half an egg, as Meb said, and on the weekend we'd have a full egg. They taught us how to dance and things. They were very good to us. They took us to places. I remember going to the cinema, which is an outdoor cinema, and that used to be a minefield in itself. So we'd go, we'd go to the cinema, but we'd be prepped beforehand to be very quiet when we approached the cinema, because all kids would have to suddenly hide under baskets and blankets so they weren't detected. We'd get through to the cinema, we'd park up in our spot, and suddenly hundreds of kids would come out to the cars running a mock while the parents watched the cinema. So that used to be an interesting thing, because you'd gone to be told ‘shh’ or told not to move or sneeze or anything. But those were always fun times. We had a squat toilet, which I remember, although we had an indoor toilet. The house was very modern, but it was a squat toilet. Didn't see Unnie very much. We spent a lot of time with Shillu and Nashir uncle. They took us to places and beaches and things. We were very close to them. And as Meb said, we called them Junior Mom and Dad, and they were like our mum and dad to a certain extent. So coming to this country, I certainly found it very hard to suddenly adjust to a new routine, because we hadn't, you know, we had a very regimented routine with auntie and uncle, so that was different. And then going to school here was a little bit different as well, because we suddenly got up one morning and we went off to Albany Road School, which is not far from here, but coming here to the camp, I don't remember. I remember getting on the coach. I remember it being cold and dark. We drove for a long time before we went to Plymouth, to a camp called Plasterdown, which was, I think, army barracks. I remember that we were lucky, and like other families, that we had the middle section of the camp, which were the two ends of long dorms, if you like. But we had the middle section, which were two rooms, which would probably be offices, messes, I guess at the time, but two rooms. So we had Mebs and me in one room, and mum and dad and Farah in the other room. So we were very fortunate in that way. We went to school there as well. They were like outside temporary schools. I remember meeting Shanaz as there. Shanaz and I used to go to school there. I do remember doing Jamatkhana there with...  I don't remember Hussainbhai and Fatmabai by at that time. But obviously they were at the camp, and we did go to Khana. 

Mum worked for the WRVS where she helped with, you know, giving clothes and things. I remember getting a doll in a pram. And there was a young lad who used to collect dolls and things, and I was asked to give that away, which really upset me, but greater scheme of things was probably nothing. And then coming here, don't recall being in camp long, coming here instead, going off to school, we went to school almost immediately. Remember my first day at school in Albany Road, they had one of those tall desks where the teachers used to, old type desks, where teachers used to sit, and I was, I was asked to sit there, and all these people, all these kids, were looking at me because obviously they hadn't seen an Asian person. There was no other Asian person in my class. But made friends quickly. The children were quite friendly. So I did make some friends. And one thing, if I recall now, I don't remember having friends that came home from Aga Khan school. I don't remember that all our friends were in school. So friendships were different to what I see children growing up here, and as we grow up, and I find, I find that's quite an interesting reflection.

 

Mehboob Allibhai  18:22

You're correct about not mingling with children outside school. The other opportunity, so we grew up mostly with adults around us, and they were very, very caring, loving, incorporated us in a lot of things, the more extended family, mums, uncles and cousins also lived behind cine, and I can remember visiting them. We went to mosque, the Jamatkhana, which was a spectacular building, absolutely spectacular. And we used to go to mission class. We wouldn't go to pray with the adults. We would go to mission class. And on the big occasions, like Khushali or whatever celebrations, we would then go with the family, or as a family, to Jamatkhana and perform our prayers. I can remember when the Aga Khan IV actually visited Kampala. And also remember that on the Fridays in the evening, the whole Jamatkhana silhouette was decked out with lights, and it was amazing, it was like a fairy tale. As far as other memories... we lived in Kikwanda. Oh, mum and dad lived in Kikwanda, and as Shel said, we visited a lot, and have very distinctive memories of Shell stepping on a sadi, which is basically a tawa to cook chapatis on, and she, for some reason, stepped on it. So I can remember that. I can also remember my mum used to have an Alsatian called Gypsy, ferocious animal, scary. It used to be chained away because the only person who could pacify it was my mother. And the shop was a large, I suppose, what would you call a convenience shop, but it had a petrol station. Mum and Dad had a few tailors who would sew clothes, employed. I can remember the storeroom, there used to be a long, long glass cabinet where things would be displayed or be placed on. And I can remember the sweets and the lollipops oh, I can remember Pez. Do you remember Pez? 

 

Shelina Allibhai

Yeah, yeah. 

 

Mehboob Allibhai

We had Pez sweets, the way you used to flip the head in a sweet used to pop out. The first time we went to Nairobi was an amazing experience, because I'd never seen... all the lighting in the in the night in Uganda were the white fluorescent type. In Nairobi, they were the amber, orange colour. When you drove around the night. In Kampala, I had, I rescued a small foe, dear, and that was my little pet. Unfortunately, it met Gypsy and then it wasn't. In the storeroom we used to have bags and bags of Haitian bags, probably 25 holding sugar, coffee, all those kind of things that were sold in the shop, beans. The shop was mostly corrugated painted blue. In the backyard, there was a couple of outhouses where the deer, little bit foe stayed, and a massive Python was buried, because we'd found a Python in the storeroom, and to my recollection, it must have been at least seven meters or so. It was huge. That house was in a perimeter compound.

 

Shelina Allibhai  23:04

I can't be far behind, yeah, 

 

Mehboob Allibhai  23:07

I can't remember playing in that little area, because I was always out. We had a mosque just further up the road...

 

Shelina Allibhai

Jamatkhana 

 

Mehboob Allibhai

Which you have to walk through, yeah, Jamatkhana which was a little clear land, and that was, again a blue corrugated building. There was a badminton court that my mum and dad, along with Padre, who was a Catholic priest from Canada, who was very, very friendly with mum and dad. He again had a white beetle, I can remember, and Padre, mum and dad and somebody else, I guess, used to play badminton outside. To get to Jamatkhana we used to, there was a pathway, but it was straight through a bush, so you'd have trees, sugarcane, banana plants and coffee. Coffee, lots and lots of coffee. My memory of Jamatkhana was not so much doing the prayer, but at the behind the khana used to be the area that we used to play football in. And I can distinctively remember. I can't remember how old I was, maybe 6/7, I don't know, playing football there with the local kids, Ugandan, and our football used to be made of paper, cellotape and elastic bands, but it was a decent size, and I was in goals, and immediately behind the goals would be this bush, and I can remember them shouting, Mussotto, mussotto, mussotto, which didn't mean anything to me, because we predominately grew up speaking mostly English, later to find out that it was actually a snake. 

Do you remember anything about that one?

 

Shelina Allibhai  25:01

Yeah, I was sitting on the veranda of the Jamatkhana, and they were screaming, and there was this snake behind you. I recall it as a rattlesnake. And then I remember a sudden reaction from everybody, and you all battered in.

 

Mehboob Allibhai  25:17

okay, so it wouldn't have been a rattlesnake, because I don't think they're in Africa, but it was a snake that was probably hissing away. Eventually, we flicked the snake onto the football pitch and then proceeded to beat it sticks. And it eventually, and it was quite amazing because it was cut in half, and both ends were still moving and that was that. The other thing I remember very distinctively, and that this is something that is amazing about our smelling, our sense of smell and how it triggers memory, I think, very distinctive colour, soil, very red, so almost of an iron had a very distinctive smell. And I didn't realise because we were used to it. But I went back to Kenya in about 1981 whenever it was, it was in the 80s. I hadn't been there for a long time to visit my grandparents, and one day it rained, and two things jogged my memory. One was the size that the droplets after the rain bounced on the soil, how it would splash out. And secondly, the amazing, amazing smell that took me straight back to my childhood.

 

Shelina Allibhai  26:55

It's quite distinct, it's indescribable, but very comforting and homey kind of smell. And the rain drops on, were so big you could hear them on the corrugated thing when we used to stay. 

 

Mehboob Allibhai

Hailstones 

 

Shelina Allibhai  

Yeah, but it was just rain. It just seemed like, remember holidays we went to these hot springs in Fort Portal, and then we'd go to the farm.

 

 

Mehboob Allibhai  27:18

And, okay, so Ford Portal, what's your memory? 

 

Shelina Allibhai  27:22

I remember there was lots of hot springs. We were just sitting in those hot springs. We stayed in a nice hotel, and Heather kaka was with us at one time, one holiday, Heather kaka came with us. So I remember that.

 

Mehboob Allibhai  27:38

Okay so hot springs.

 

Shelina Allibhai  27:41

Fort Portal, it was in Fort Portal. 

 

Mehboob Allibhai  27:43

Yeah, Fort Portal hot springs. I remember the hotel. I can remember having egg on toast, which I hadn't had before. Now, I think that's where I've got my taste for black pepper, because I absolutely loaded it, and that has always stayed with me. As far as the hot springs went, I can remember the smell of the sulphur, the clay bubbling over, the water bubbling I can also remember that we went for a picnic there. So Mum with her little bucket hat. And we all went there, and we were, I think we were just our underwear. Yeah, we'd go to the spring and we'd have hard boiled eggs. Do you also remember during that trip there was a rope bridge connecting to...

 

Shelina Allibhai

I don't recall that, no.

 

Mehboob Allibhai  

There was a rope bridge with slats to walk across, and there'd be the odd slat. It was terrifying. And I think I have some kind of phobia with steps with gaps between with that. The other thing, so that's Ford Portal, the farm you're on about was not too far from where we lived in Kikwanda. Now we had lived in two different places in Kikwanda. In not that it was big, but it was on an incline, and the original shop we had, I think we always had, the shop was at the bottom. We lived there temporarily, and we moved not long after the bandits came, if you remember them. Do you remember that?

 

Shelina Allibhai

Yeah I remember that.

 

Mehboob Allibhai  

So on a Sunday, the shop used to be closed, probably about midday, or if it was even open on a Sunday, so somebody came to buy a petrol and what we used to do on a Sunday was have a siesta and lie in bed with Dad, if you remember that. And they wanted petrol, Dad went out. You and I were still on the bed. And then the next thing I can remember is Dad coming back with a man holding a gun, couple of gunmen. Mum was in the room as well. Told dad, you know, give us the money. Give us the money. Now, Kikwanda, or back in the those days, you'd have probably had all your money until you went to the city, due to the banking or by stock. So they looted the whole shop as much as they could put on their pickup. And they kept on asking. Now, I had my own savings, about 100 schillings, which was a lot of money for a little kid then, and it was in a cupboard. So I ran straight away, gave it to him and said, now leave my dad. They wouldn't believe that we didn't have any money, or mum didn't have any more jewellery or whatever. And dad was lying on the floor, and they shot at him. Thankfully, the gun got cocked when he took the shot, and it misfired, because he wasn't standing very far away from that he was aiming at his head, and he actually managed to miss Dad, and shot into the concrete cement floor by about an inch or two. And that's when we went and had the other house at the top the hill. It wasn't... because that wasn't the first time when that got robbed. And the idea of it being that if we lived separately from the shop, we'd be a bit safer. I can remember you being stung by a bumblebee in mum's... auntie and uncle's house, Gubbyboo’s house, and your knee flared up, huge, huge. And I think you still suffer from allergy to insect bites? Yeah. So that was that.

 

Shelina Allibhai  32:27

I recall the outside toilet, again, a squat toilet, which was in a actually, it was quite scary outside. It was a little shed, just no lights at all, completely pitch black. You don't know what's in there with you. If you had to do it today, you probably wouldn't do it, but in those days, we just went, it was just so natural. Also remember, that that big house that I used to get a doll for my birthday from Heather kaka every year, and that doll would get put up on the shelf, and I get the one from the previous year down, but obviously I wanted to play with the most recent one, but I was always given the one for the year before, so that was a memory. And we also went to much in Murchison Falls, where there's hippos. You'd be on the boat, and you'd see the hippos bobbin up and down. And I recall going to Jinja. And then there was a Fall there as well. 

 

 

Mehboob Allibhai  

Yeah, it was Jinja Falls, it was a hydro dam.

 

Shelina Allibhai

And we used to go to see Fua and Faiba. I don't remember. I remember the odd occasion. This is where most of our cousins, main cousins.

 

Mehboob Allibhai  33:50

First cousins, maybe.

 

Shelina Allibhai  33:53

I don't have memories with spending time with them, and that relationship sort of continued when we came here.

 

Farah Allibhai  34:03

So just to... you've told me a lot of information, and your story there is really quite detailed. So just to go back, why were you given castor oil?

 

Shelina Allibhai  34:17

For, to help with cleaning out your stomach. There's a lot of, also to prevent worms and things.

I r

Mehboob Allibhai  34:25

Well what you got to remember is, though we had running water in taps in Kampala and standpipes, the water was not purified, so any water you would usually drink would have been pre boiled and then put in a refrigerator to drink. Also you got things like Bilharzia, which are little worms, thick, you know, not thick ones. But you've got also kind of water borne pathogens. So Castor oil used to, it was believed that you would cleanse your gut, you would also get something called Antepar. Antepar was something that was used for deworming you. 

 

Shelina Allibhai

Once a month? 

 

Mehboob Allibhai

No, no, I don't remember that many times taking Antepar, but I could, I can remember it. 

I remember going swimming and I never swim. Swam before, jumped in the water and tried to learn to swim. That was with a lady who used who stayed with us for a while. Jinja, I can remember very, very well, and that would be my first access into a Mandir, which is a Hindu temple, and getting Prasad, which is something that they give you, and Puja that you would offer, which is a prayer, flying a kite for the first time there, and eating jam on toast dollops.

 

Farah Allibhai  36:15

So when you were in school, you mentioned paying allegiance, allegiance to who and what?

 

Mehboob Allibhai  36:23

Well, that would have been, because it was an Aga Khan school and most of the students, because it was a fee paying school, would have been Ismailis to start with. So it would be allegiance to our faith, allegiance to our country, because they have an anthem, I can't remember it, and allegiance to our teachers to be good.

 

Farah Allibhai  36:55

And your outings to the Ladybird shop and wearing Clark's shoes and being turned out, did your aunt and uncle pay for those or was that subsidized, did they take you to the shop?

 

Shelina Allibhai  37:07

Mum and Dad used to come in. So mum used to take us. She'd take us to those things. Mum and dad paid for our schooling. We just stayed with Auntie. We boarded with auntie and uncle.

 

Farah Allibhai  37:17

So was your life in Uganda, whether it be in Kampala, Kikwanda or kakamera, was it very mixed between Asians and Africans and Europeans, or was it quite segregated?

 

Shelina Allibhai  37:29

I don’t remember Europeans so much in the, obviously in Kampala, it was mostly Asians, and in Kikwanda, it was all the local people, because it was a village, I remember sitting making cow pats to put onto the huts inside of the hut, sitting and making raffia mats with the families while Mebs was off cycling or whatever he was doing with the boys. So I remember doing making those cow pats and putting them inside the huts to make walls.

 

Farah Allibhai  38:03

So your parents were quite happy for you to mix with local Ugandans, and they welcomed you into their homes. 

 

Shelina Allibhai

Yeah

 

Farah Allibhai

And friendship circles.

 

Mehboob Allibhai  38:11

Absolutely, there was no, not any difference. Apart from, we were in Kampala, we went to school. And in terms of, Europeans, of Caucasians, you wouldn't meet many of them. I didn't think, I don't remember seeing a lot of them, in Kampala to start with. But like I said, my teacher, her daughter, and the other one was Padre, the Catholic priest from Canada who spent a lot of time with mum and dad and us, as far as the local indigenous population, again, our interaction in Kampala would have been what they used to term house boy or house servant, but basically employed housekeepers. And during the holidays, if we went to Kikwanda, it was either two of male, I don't remember any female maid, but the two of them houseboys. One was called Johan, who had a drinking problem, and the other one was Toful. At the age of five, I was I did so well in school. In fact, I came first, and Mum and Dad bought me a bicycle, which I learned to ride in Kikwanda within probably two, three days, and then disappeared with Toful for half a day. And I've been told that I had actually gone to visit his mother, who lived about 20 kilometres away. It was an adventure, because it was the first time I drank from a pond and wild days and playing with the kids football. It was all indigenous Africans. We didn't know any different, or were told any different rather, because we had a very cosmopolitan life, completely English education. We had religious education, and we were always told to be kind, generous, helpful, and never disparage other people. That was really frowned upon. 

 

Shelina Allibhai  40:53

Well, I don't recall that. It just didn't come into conversation. Everyone was just, everyone was every person was a person in their own right.

 

Mehboob Allibhai  41:01

Yeah, and I don't think... that's because you've got a child's optics, but I can never remember, even with the house maids or house men working there, ever being reprimanded or anything like that. It was, there was order, but it was all very, very gentle. The most gruesome thing I've seen was in Kikwanda,  we must have been about seven, eight years old, and the bandits that robbed the shops, they were eventually caught by the army. Whether they were the original people or not, I'll never know, but they were dropped along this road between Kampala to Katera, and there were lots of little villages where there were shops, and so they went and dropped one of these bandits in each one of those villages to fish local retribution. And it was in the evening, and they beat this man to death. It was so brutal, but it didn't traumatise me, oddly enough, it's, you know, bits of skin folding off him, and it's unfortunately, one thing that I've seen time and time again, is that in Africa, life is cheap, but they are the most generous people, most welcoming and peaceful people you'll ever meet.

 

 

Farah Allibhai  42:50

But there seems to be a strong sense of punishment then a moral code in how they endorse

 

Mehboob Allibhai  42:58

Local justice you mean?

 

Farah Allibhai  42:59

Yes.

 

Mehboob Allibhai  43:00

So I'm only surmising from what I know now that local justice was a way of preventing such actions because it was so brutal, you could actually see a result, because you live in villages, it will always pass down the villages that this happened to this person,  that was, you know, the news, if they had actually taken those bandits or robbers and put them in prison, nobody's seen any justice, because when they came, they didn't just rob, they shot people. We were, I can remember with that time when we were there and we ran behind Jamatkhana up to Mum’s uncle, which was on a hill. They were spraying machine guns and somebody actually, I don't know if it hit them in the leg, but they fell down not far from me. I was lucky not to be hit by a bullet, I'm guessing, but they must have killed and done some awful things along the way with guns, because, like I said, life is cheap. 

 

Farah Allibhai  44:13

Do you think that that was because Asians were particularly targeted because of their wealth, or do you think that that was just the general way of coping with the economic status in Uganda, people their access to guns. 

 

Mehboob Allibhai  44:29

Okay, so I can't say what the economic situation would have been like, because I, at that stage, never saw any poverty, even back in Kikwanda, which was a village, there wasn't extreme poverty or anything.

 

Farah Allibhai  44:47

From the life you've described your upbringing sounds quite comfortable to the kind of African situation that we've come to understand in the west now. So my question is, you didn’t see any deprivation was that in the African community.

 

Mehboob Allibhai  45:04

Yes, I'm not saying that Ismailis were rich by anything, but they were the backbone of the economy. They were entrepreneurs, people from Gujarat that predominantly come there who are entrepreneurial people in general. Now the optics that you've got to look at, the context you have to put the expulsion, the Exodus, is that the British were in East Africa, Uganda, Kenya, Tanzania, and many other countries. They put systems in administrative systems, so cities like Nairobi, Kampala, were very, very cosmopolitan. They ran really well. They had good roads, lighting, running water, those are great things. The only deprivation you would come to see would be disabled people. I'm talking about the African indigenous people, where they would have had polio, because at some stage it must have been rife there, because you would see a lot of not a lot lot, but all the people, they used to call them moskini, which is beggars. So not... people like polio would be begging. Might be a couple of alcoholics. There was a bustling market where the Africans used to go and we used to go there quite often. It was where the bus stop was a station. We weren't sheltered, I wouldn't say, and yes, we probably did live a privileged life, and that in turn, provoked what happened, because Idi Amin is a product of the UK Government and the Israeli government, and they thought they could be able to control him, and he pulled a blind one, a blinder on them, because he said, no, I won't do this. I will repatriate this wealth and distribute it to our people, which is the black people. I can remember the curfews just before we were asked to leave. I can remember him in being inaugurated as President.

 

Farah Allibhai  47:46

What were the curfews about? And how did it feel around the time of inauguration? Did you sense, even as a child? Did you sense a shift in the atmosphere?

 

Mehboob Allibhai  47:56

Yes, the people are very joyous. Not everybody, I'm guessing, but as Asians, we weren't. I didn't feel, but then maybe it was politically naive, or was shielded from it, but I didn't. I wasn't made to feel that we have to be apprehensive and things are dangerous. Curfews happened only because of when the elections were going to take place. They were afraid of a military coup. But when Idi Amin was installed, it was jubilant, massive celebrations. You know, you know, I got carried away in that, because everyone was happy, and they must... if everybody's happy, then so should you be, whether you know about the politics or not, but they were liberated. That was their Messiah. Unfortunately, with all liberations, you do have the danger of megalomaniacs and dictators. 

 

Shelina Allibhai  49:10

I have one memory, when we were coming from Kampala to Kikwanda.

 

Farah Allibhai  49:17

Is that the time of the elections, or when he came in?

 

Shelina Allibhai  49:19

No when he was already in I think it's just before we got told to go. Where the car was stopped and searched, and that that I remember as a fearful memory, because these men told us to get out the car, and they had guns, and it was different to the where we got robbed, and that was scary as well. But this was different because it was, it felt menacing, like real menacing.

 

Mehboob Allibhai  49:47

I was because I think there were more road checks and de facto was it was the army. And they're always in uniform, and they always carried guns. The police were slightly different. They went around with pistol batons, and they might have pistol, I can't remember, but their threatening weapon would have been a big stick. But the army were very regimented in the way they looked, and so they did look menacing, because we've never seen anything like that, not in our streets. We saw police, but we never saw army, and that would have been just before the expulsion. And you're right. There were a lot of roadblocks and things, but I found it fascinating, I wasn't fearful.

 

Farah Allibhai  50:45

Is that because your parents didn't show out with fear? 

 

Mehboob Allibhai  50:50

My parents, our parents, were incredibly brave, brave people, very religious, so everything was in the hand of God, and God would protect them in all situations and circumstances. But very brave, you can't understand some of the brutality looking at from the democratic perspective, because everything kind of ticks along. And you can debate, you can protest, and this, that and the other. But in Africa, they don't have access to that kind of debate or engagement, and it does spill into passion. And then, unfortunately, sometimes that when you have a lot of passion and two opposing sides, they may be violence. And as I said, I don't know where the psych of Africa comes from, and I've seen it and heard from it, from a lot of people that, you know, life is cheap, per se. I don't think that that's an African thing. I think that is more likely to be a colonial thing, because if you look at the history of the Mau Mau and the massacres, you look at the apartheid and the massacres everywhere, you will see that violence is the only way, and we call it struggle when it's all settled and the dust has settled, and that the reality is, these people, whose homeland it is, are very gentle, loving people. They live in harmony with neighbours, nature, everything, and the only other place I've seen anything like that is in Thailand, where there are a lot of Buddhists.

 

Farah Allibhai  53:04

So what are your recollections of the time of expulsion? You would have been, what eight? Did you say? 

 

Mehboob Allibhai  53:12

8 and 10 months when we came here so prior to the expulsion, I can remember my uncle, we call him Kaka, buy me an amazing pair of brown shoes, because all our shoes were known to be black, but he bought brown ones with gold eyelets. After that, I can't remember actually getting to the airport or any of the airport, but I can remember that I was still it must have been, we must have been pulled out of school or something like this. I don't think, just remembering the clothing I had on, which was khaki shorts, white socks and white shirt. We landed from what I know now is Stansted. We landed here in the dark, which would have been October 18 or 19th or thereabouts. And the one thing I've never seen in my life is snow. But guess what? It actually snowed that day, and for some reason, the driver thought that after traumatic 12 hour flight, plus whatever, however long we were at the airport, because it's not like you can book in and do an orderly check in and check out. You would have probably been there for about a day or so. And the one thing I do remember at the airport in Uganda in Entebbe was the army harassing a lot of the people leaving and taking things like gold, anything that was visibly valuable, they would take.

 

Shelina Allibhai  54:44

I remember them searching your nappy because they thought we would, we had hidden gold jewellery and stuff. Mum and I were put into a little it was a little cubby with curtains. And then they just searched us. And then they insisted. They asked Mum where her gold was. Mum said she didn't have any. And they said, you must have and they then proceeded to then just check you and take your nappy off and shred the nappy to bits. 

 

Mehboob Allibhai  55:24

By the way, I remember you being born as well. That's a memory from Uganda.

 

Shelina Allibhai  55:29

And yeah, so that and yeah, that was I remember that at the airport. 

 

 

Mehboob Allibhai  55:35

Can you remember that when we got to the camp in Plasterdown. Plasterdown is a military base just outside Teignmouth that one of the Hindu ladies had bought a jar of pickles. 

 

Shelina Allibhai

Yeah, she used to carry it everywhere.

 

Mehboob Allibhai

And she actually had her jewellery in the jar of pickles.

 

Shelina Allibhai  56:01

Yeah, people, yeah. This because Mom, we used to see this woman, these many women there wasn't just the one. They used to walk around and they'd have their wherever they went, if they were going to the washroom or whatever. And we’d wonder and then I think Mom asked one of them that, why? Why are you hanging on to your pickles so much? And they said, it's not just pickles. You know that our livelihoods are in here, and that's how they smuggled their gold out, which was then what they used to set up their new lives here.

 

Mehboob Allibhai  56:30

Because Dad bought travelers checks before he left, and dollars, and when he tried to cash them here, the travelers checks were reported as stolen, and the dollars were apparently forgeries. So we literally came with nothing we well, we literally did, because everything that was packed away suitcases and I remember lots of pillows and what we call goddris, which is a type of blanket come duvet, they were also packed. There was a lot. It wasn't just like a two week holiday to Spain suitcase. It was like suitcases, pillows. We didn't know where we were going when we landed and got to camp. 

 

Shelina Allibhai  57:14

We had to have our fingerprints. They took our fingerprints, all of our fingerprints when we came at the airport.

 

Mehboob Allibhai  57:19

But all our personal belongings that came in the plane were actually somewhere in India, or I can remember that kind of conversation, but we never had anything. So we literally came here with dad’s traveller’s checks, dollars, and the clothes that we had on when we left. Because, as I said, go back to digress, but you just triggered something. Snow... the driver... So we came off a plane, got on the coach, and instead of going straight to Plymouth, we drove around London. Had a little tour of London and snowing, and then we were in Plasterdown. In Plasterdown, I can remember it being so windy. And at this camp, they were actually dormitories, and not messes. And the dormitories were these arch, semi circle shape hangers. I don't remember what you said about the two separate rooms.

 

Shelina Allibhai  58:29

Yeah, we had the middle bed. Yeah, you and me there, then mum, dad and Farah.

 

Mehboob Allibhai  58:34

don't remember much of that, but what I do remember was when we... we didn't go immediately come to think about. We didn't immediately go to plaster down. We had a stopover, night, must be in somewhere outside London. And there was food distribution. And there was clothes distribution, because obviously we came unprepared for the weather here. And probably never had any, the chill that is the weather here ever so I can remember it. It was very chaotic - food, clothes. I mean, people were just taking heaps and heaps of everything, but not even checking if it was going to fit. Then there was a lot of generous donations of warm clothing, but there was nobody to marshal it. So people were just, it was a free for all. And I can remember mum and dad telling us we'll just wait. And we did, literally just wait until everybody did finish fighting over the clothes. And it was a little bit normal. And I could also remember that with the food, I can remember a Granny Smith apple or some kind of green apple anyway, but again, and I can remember the cheese sandwich there, but again, we did not get involved in the melee for the food or the clothes. Then we went to Plasterdown, in Plasterdown, I can remember the shape of the accommodation. I remember watching football on TV, a black and white TV, and I think it was a team called West Brom. We were in Plasterdown down for a month. In that month, Dad had come down to Cardiff, and he could have gone to London, because he already had a brother there, but he chose to come to Cardiff. In Tavistock I remember being hosted by family, do you remember them? There was a family with two young girls. I remember walking from the camp to the village Tavistock as a kid, and guess what, because I picked up a pair of riding boots, and they were excruciating, but they look funky. I can remember it being so, so windy. Never mind the howling wind. They would actually knock sheep off their feet. It was that windy, because they own the camp that dotted round the fields were sheep. Coming to Cardiff, I was so excited, because it was a two storey house, I must have had any illusions of grandeur all my life, my aspiration came true at the end. There was a fireplace and the smell of toast, and it was so warm after the camp, to go into this house, because that was exciting, and within 24 hours, I managed to make friends with the kids next door, went to town and disappeared for three four hours, put mum and dad into a right panic, and then didn't get hit or anything, which I should, because it's quite strange, as Shell said, that we had two parents, two sets of parents, Senior mum and dad in Kampala, and junior mum and dad who would have us on holidays and all they would come and see us every other week, bringing cassava chips, bags of it, huge. But I don't think they knew, you know how to respond to what I had just done. I got told off, where did you go? I just went to this way, this way, this way, and I went into town, it's lovely. That was before my parents went school, I can remember the first day in school. My teacher was Mrs. McLean. I was in form 2. It was a kid called Driscoll there sitting with glasses with blonde hair, and Mrs. McLean introduced me, and then she was Scottish, and she wore red tartan. 

 

Farah Allibhai

Was that standard two 

 

Mehboob Allibhai

Standard two in Albany Road and then after introducing me, the most peculiar thing was said to me. She asked me where I came from. Tell the kids where you're from, blah, blah, blah, a little bit about yourself. And she asked me, why is my hair not curly if I come from Africa? 

 

Farah Allibhai

Who asked you that sorry?

 

Mehboob Allibhai

My teacher this, this is the kind of society we came into, not because they were racist or anything, but they weren't knowledgeable to start with. And as Shell said, there weren't many Asians. Vinay was here, Vinay Mooneeram, so obviously, his family's been here because of his dad and everything, but they hadn’t seen brown people, very few black people. So it's not so much about inherent racism, but an unconscious bias about what they perceived was beyond. I couldn't believe, by the time I was in standard three or four that people, even our neighbors, for that matter, older people. But, you know, they'd never been to London, and in two years, we'd cross the border and gone to London. You know, education system was, we were mathematically far superior. I was about four years ahead of my class all the way through. English, we spoke BBC English, grammatically BBC English, so it was a... that is something I struggled with because it was counterintuitive, especially colloquialism, the word ‘init’, which is, isn't it? I couldn't say until I was 35 or so. I really struggled with that.

 

Farah Allibhai  1:05:00

So what else were your early memories of settling in Wales, apart from being questioned about why your hair wasn’t... why you didn’t have afro hair. 

 

Shelina Allibhai  1:05:10

So coming at the time of the winter months. So first thing I remember people sitting outside the shops asking for penny for a guy, for guy, Fawkes, which was like really strange, people eating pomegranates with toothpicks and pins. And our first Christmas, Mary Hillier, who was one of the social workers, who was appointed to us, who lives used to live down at the end of the street that we now that we now live  in Aaron street. She took us to a Christmas concert in City Hall. And I remember the massive, massive Christmas tree with lights like the ones you see in this, in cinema, in the films. And that was my first memory of a Christmas here. And then we met people like Mr. Mooneeram, who helped us a lot in different ways.

 

Mehboob Allibhai  1:06:11

We were very lucky. So you reminded me something when we talk about school. First memory of school, did you remember the school was so old that they had actually outside toilets. 

 

Shelina Allibhai

Yes, and the tracing paper. 

 

Mehboob Allibhai

Yeah, wax paper for toilet paper and the toilets were actually exposed, though the cubicles were covered, yeah, all the air was circulated between the top of the door and the bottom of the door. 

Who was the dinner lady? 

 

Shelina Allibhai

I don't remember 

 

Mehboob Allibhai

Mrs. Nibbs. I could go on and on about school. Luckily, I think I embedded very, very quickly, because language wasn't a difference. If anything, I was considered posh. The bridging thing that allowed my integration so seamlessly was sport. I was good at football and football is the game of the world. Everybody plays it and can play it, and that was all the way from playing with kids in the streets on the payments to school to high school. Sports is a very great unifier.

 

 

Farah Allibhai  1:07:42

So what was your experience of that? Was it similar to your brother’s?

 

Shelina Allibhai  1:07:48

So school, I remember, I had friends I didn't maybe go out as much. I went to brownies, and then we quickly set up Jamatkhana in Cardiff, and that was in our house. So a lot of our time was spent with the community. So Shainaz, obviously, Hussain bhai came here so Shainaz was a friend as well from a very young age. So what I remember is, friendship wise, it was okay, but in terms of studying, I probably struggled more, not necessarily, because I wasn't at the same level as Mebs suggested, but maybe I found the style of teaching maybe a little bit different to what I was used to, and I struggled with that all the way through, I think, until I qualified and went on. And I think my success has really been through my work rather than my academic.

 

Mehboob Allibhai  1:08:47

I think as far as schooling comes. There was two things for yourself was one, it was very, very disruptive, leaving Uganda for you, I think I had a lot more stability that was being older than you to start with, and I was a little bit more independent. And I think you found it difficult not being with me all the time when we came here, because you and I were like two peas in a pod. You were like a shadow. I could not go anywhere without you.

 

Shelina Allibhai  1:09:22

And I think that goes back to the comment that we made. We were always surrounded by adults, so we were the only two together all the time so having that then detachment, yeah.

 

Mehboob Allibhai  1:09:32

So I think that there was a ripping apart a little bit for you, yeah. Because also, like I said, I started playing football and then cricket and very quickly, got on with being out of the house at a very young age. You know, Mum and Dad, I don't know, didn't know how to control do they give me enough freedom or you know, there was lots of things that were probably very conflicting for them, but I always came home, I was always okay. And the one thing that I've noticed over the years is East African Asians were a lot more able to integrate into a society in the UK. And the same thing with the Kenyans, who've gone to Canada because of the colonial past, and with the colonial past, and we didn't have the oppression or subjugation that the Indian subcontinent had. That was a different time. So we benefited from the administrative system, the education system. So it was easy to integrate. Where I see the conflicts these days is they're asking people to assimilate. So, you know, we were able to integrate because we came from a very similar model. But as time has gone on, when you know, Bengalis came to Cardiff, the Pakistanis came to Cardiff. They found that very difficult, because they never had that assimilating experience. They were very ghettoised. I said, I mean, most of them came from places like Bradford as we were going on. I digress.

 

Farah Allibhai  1:11:28

So your experience of integration wasn't as swift as your brothers. Would you say it was a bit more challenging?

 

 

Shelina Allibhai  1:11:35

No, I integrated. But I guess again, as Meb said, there was, I sort of felt it more, because suddenly Mebs wasn’t there as much. And then there was also a younger sister who was in the picture, whose... mom's time was spent with that so I suddenly said, again, felt a sense of, I don't belong anymore, because we've been taken from parents that we sort of assumed were our parents. Because although we understood that we were there, were just there... but predominantly senior Mum and Dad were, were the parents I - my formative years, if you like, and therefore, suddenly I've got, I'm sort of in a place, but I did have, I didn't feel bad about going to school. I was in the netball team. I played baseball. We used to play the wreck so I had friends in that. But again, in my own way, I was struggling to find a place for myself, which I really didn't do until probably I left home and started my first job. Up to that point, I was carrying on and had probably this instability about me, but and once I left home, once I left home for a new job, and that's when I probably became more independent.