Karim Meghji was born in Kasiisi, Uganda, in 1957. As a child, he remembers running around the bush, playing volleyball with his father and catching fish with ingenious makeshift fishing rods. His family fled Uganda when he was 12 years old, experiencing violence during the expulsion, but arrived safely in the UK and lived at the Tonfanau Resettlement Camp. The family settled in the Rhondda, where Karim battled racism and was a carer and translator for his parents, but he also encountered “some of the kindest people” who supported his family through difficult times. He eventually used his life experience to become a community support worker, a job he did and was passionate about until he retired.

This interview is over five separate video recordings.

Transcript of interview with Karim Meghji by Perminder Dhillon

Interview (part 1) with Karim Meghji

Karim  

I was born Karim Kuruji, which was my father's, my grandfather's name.
We had to change our name because the only link to the British Empire was my great, great grandfather, Meghji. So we changed our name to Meghji to enable us to come to Britain.

As Edward Heat had said, you have to have some connection of the East African connection to India and how the Raj... and how I got there.

We came in 1972 after being expelled by, Idi Amin. And, we went to London for one day and then we were shipped. Well, not shipped, but a train ride to Tonfanau camp in North Wales, where I grew up and, stayed there for about seven, eight months.

After that period, we moved from Tonfanau to the Rhondda valleys where I grew, where I grew up a lot, very quickly, small community, fantastic people, fantastic neighbours. My grandparents who adopted me didn't speak much English, so when we arrived we were supported by an uncle, my grandmother's sister's husband, Mehdi Masa and Gula Masi. They both, God rest their souls, they passed on.

He did most of the work for us, you know, all the legalised processes and everything because my grandparents want that well educated But they did their best, you know, they raised me and they had my - well, they are my sisters because we grew up like brother and sister Munira, who's my oldest sister and Shairoz, who's my younger sister. But she's actually my first cousin.

So you know, my grandmother adopted my first cousin Shairoz because her mother passed away through diabetes in Kampala and Nizar Bapa couldn't look after Shairoz himself. So Shairoz was raised by me because my grandma passed away, so she came to live with me and I raised her.

Shairoz has learning needs, but she's very, very astute, life astute. She's raised two kids, Ramal, Shakira Ramal is learning to become a pharmacist. Shakira is an… she's got a degree and she's an ex prison officer and now works for DVLA.

I... Trebanog, I moved on from Trebanog then as a 16, no qualifications. Worked in a button factory making buttons and then went to work for, heating place called Pontypridd Sheet Metals, which we did, the, trunking and something for central heating, not central heating, office heating and things like that. Where I worked in the Port Talbot Steelworks. I worked for the steelworks I actually worked for Pontypridd sheet metal and in, in area we put the heating and ventilation systems in and that's where my career started, using my hands in learning other trades, met a partner, got married, she had a child, which I raised at my own. Then we had two children, Azad and Ashifa after six, eight months of being married, we had a good relationship prior after marriage, not six, eight months that’s a lie because Azad was born, Ashifa four years younger than Azad. So it was about four years with a relationship all in all from relationship and marriage. But six months after our marriage it broke down, I had custody because my ex wouldn't... Azad wouldn’t eat without me being present.

He was four years old and I used to have contact regularly. So the thing was I'll pay for everything for them.

Not a problem but got to a point where my ex-wife turned around and said she couldn't cope with Ashifa. Ashifa was six months born, six months old and she was premature born. We were told to take her home because she's not going to live.

And in that time, that's what they did. Just we can't do anything for this child because her bowel movements and all that weren’t formed. So you had to rub cream around the urinal area to get the muscles in around the bowels working. So I did that, she did that, and then of course, she had breast milk, which had to be pumped and given to her.

Six months, I had custody over Ashifa because I went in for contact and she said, I can't cope, I'm having a mental... and Ashifa came to live with me. So I was fortunate that my sister, Munira, her name is Shameem, but it was changed Munira a long time ago when she was adopted.
She had by then finished her nursing in Aberystwyth and moved to Saudia Arabia, and she was working in Saudia Arabia as a nurse.

Which meant that she bought a house in Llandaff, a two-bedroom house.

Munira turned around and had moved from Wales after qualifying and went to live in Saudi Arabia.
While she was in Saudi Arabia, she bought a two-bedroom house in Llandaff. Shairoz actually lived in the house while Munira was abroad. And when she found out I was, I had two kids and I was basically homeless, I was sofa surfing with the friends, but as soon as I had two kids, I had to find somewhere to live.
So she said, hey, my brother doesn't live on the street. And my nephews and nieces will never do that. So I went to live with... in the house. We took one room, Shairoz had the other room, and we started working there. My children got supported there by the GPs and whatever.

And after about a year, I managed very, very hard to get a place into Tonawel which is... to get a place in Tonawel at that time there was a 25 year waiting list. Tonawel was a site where, Rhondda Cynon Taff, well Rhondda Cynon Taff now, but Rhondda then would take dignitaries, anybody that came Tonawel was where they took him, but they never mentioned that ¾ of Tonawel was self owned.

So we managed to get a house, and in the house we moved in, and nearly burnt the place down first week because the people who lived there before hadn't swept the chimney and when we lit the fire and the smoke just came back down into the house. So lucky enough we got all that sorted. Then about 4 or 5 weeks into that, we had social services ringing the door.

So I said, excuse me, what's going on? Because I had taken my son, who'd been violently ill in the night, to the hospital, and the hospital called social services. And they said to, you know, your home is unhygienic. I said come on in, have a look. They looked around. They couldn’t find anything wrong with house. So I said, what's going on?

So I went to a neighbour because Rhondda is very lovely. And the neighbour turned around and told me that the people who lived in there had dogs, and within that small bedroom what they did was that was the dog's bedroom. Social services came to our house because Azad was being violently ill and what they deduced was that he'd been in a very unhygienic place, and there was a bug that he’d picked up and that was causing the illness.

So I said, well, you can come in. They looked at my house, found nothing wrong except that it needed decorating. But when you just moved in, you it takes time. So, I asked the neighbours, lovely neighbours, you know, like the Rhondda used to be very, very... And they said, yeah, that room used to be the dog's room.

And I thought, okay, well, I'll take the bed out, take the carpet up again, take the floorboards up. And it was full of dog excretion. It’d just been covered up. So I called Rhondda environmental health, they came up, they looked and they said, you can't live here. They fumigated the whole house so for two days we were sofa surfing again.

But when we moved in, we had a wonderful life because we did all that and while we were there then I worked as a mechanic, so was a qualified mechanic working for, down the road. But I started to realize that the questions that came up at that time was, what would happen if your son was ill or your daughter was ill. And I’d say, well, I'm going to be home because I've got nobody else. Oh, by that time my mum and dad, my grandparents, but I'm going to call them my mum and dad because they were, they passed on and I was on my own. Then my sisters, one was living in Saudi Arabia. No, she'd moved from Saudi Arabia to Sacramento. I was on my own then. Then my sisters, one was living in Saudi Arabia. No, she'd moved from Saudi Arabia to Sacramento. She'd married a black American and that's where they live now.
My youngest sister wanted her own place and move out, and that's fine.

So I raised him on my own, with support from friends and people that, you know, Welsh boys that I had gone to school with. The difficulty that one has when you're a single dad is a lot different than the difficulty when you're a single mum. Women will talk to each other. Men can't join in those discussions. I can give you an example is when I was taking my children to the school. I’d take my children to the school and they had, you know, the family meetings, you know, where women would go have a cup of tea and have a chatter about their difficulties and support each other. I joined that thing disbanded very quickly. So gathering support was non existent, gathering ethnic minority support non-existent because everybody was in Cardiff. And I'll be honest with you, if you were poor and you ain't got a penny, you'll be rejected by your own community. So I had no support at all, which is fine, which is great.

I then felt very much, I can't work, I'm on the welfare state. I don't like this idea of... but I learned that my skill I was able to barter. When you had a man coming round once a month, once every week, selling fruit and vegetables and all that from the van, great. I'd go to him I’d service his van, he'd give me vegetables and fruit.  I'd go to the butchers in Port, and I'd buy lamb's breast at that time, now you buy it, it's £4.00, that time it was 10p. And all I used to do with a very sharp knife, sit there and cut out the meat from the breast, from the fat of breast to feed my children.

So they had, you know, my children grew up on the potatoes and pea curry. They'll still love it. Right? we used to make, corn beef was cheap meat. So I would make corn beef, boiled potatoes and a little bit of cheese on top. That's another meal then I like, I was a typical Asian boy, man as well – I didn’t know how to blooming well cook, so there were some disasters.
My children grew up with some disasters, but I learned to cook very quickly. I learned to cook curries and rice and biriyani, samosas and things like that. Learnt different skills. And we started to move forward and then I can't remember the name of the lady from the CAB came into my life and said, Karim, you know, we can train you up, get you an advisor. Really? As far as I’m concerned, as a young child I was told you’re stupid by my dad and by his side, you know, by my step mum and all that. So you believe that, you know, as you go along, you believe that you’re stupid. But CAB changed that, they train me to become an advisor and I started advising people on their benefits rights. And the CAB, I was in Porth, my local town and then I went to Pontypridd which was the town bigger CAB. We then started to have, we had a £100,000 grant from the Welsh Office to rebuild, a bus, but not for public convenience. It was to rebuild as an office which you would take to local communities, and we would turn around and advise the elderly people of what they could claim and what they weren't claiming.

After New Year, they stopped our funding because we claimed back more than what they given us. And, of course we couldn't without that funding. We couldn't fund that bus, but you could see where the thought process was and the bus went.

After that, then I sort of went, okay. My little confidence grew, and Margaret, and  I can’t remember his name anyway, they run a place called Penygraig Community Project. They came into my life to further improve their without realizing it, but they did. What they did was they said, look, if you come here, you can work. It was mother and toddler groups, middle club, which is 7-11 and then senior Club, which is 11 to 17. So I started doing mother and toddlers and middle club. And what that meant was that I could take my children to school in the morning, right. Fetch them with me, have lunch with them, tea, and then I'd put up the air beds and all that and they could join in. Well, I was finished by 7pm, 7.30pm, so I could take them home ready for the evening meal, whatever. And they had a place, if they had homework, they could go and sit in a corner or they could socialise with the young people that were there.

That helped move me on a bit. But what it did, it showed that I could work with people.

So she must have seen something because she put me on a course and next thing I know I was a youth leader, a qualified youth leader. But all of a sudden the government started closing the youth centre so I never worked as a youth leader. But it opened my mind, I am educable, I can be educated. And, I went to Pontypridd College, it's not there now - it's gone on to a bigger property, it's been demolished. But Pontypridd College, with a diploma caring, care. Why not go for it? I look at my work now and it's so substandard. It's beyond a joke, but progression, what it did, it showed me that I could learn. I got my diploma in caring. While I was doing my diploma in caring and I met my wife, my second wife, who also had two children, so she supported me. I’d applied to Cardiff Uni for a degree in social work and I’d been accepted. So I thought great, what's that mean and what have I got to do. So to be fair, she came from upper family, you know, way above mine but an educated family and they really helped God bless her mum and dad soul because they've just not long passed away but they did help and for 27 years we supported each other.

She supported me in the first year to get my degree and I supported her to get her two degrees. We helped our children grow up with a different concept of life. Totally not the same as the way I grew up. Unfortunately, as time wore on. I got my degree. She became a top ranking member working in Wales, and she promoted right from the start, Welsh Office were all around that because it was something that she was really innovative. She actually made it work and make it grow.

As the children grew up, we grew up, we had holidays abroad and everything else. Children started seeing a different way of life. But unfortunately, life throws curves at you. We separated, I moved on, carried on. I had my degree in social work. She had her work. I was working social work. My children had a different lifestyle. But my children also learned something that they needed something. Azad is not a graduate, never, he is not theoretical he is very practical. He went to work for a mortgage advisor service, worked there for a while, then the downturn in economy, they came down. No, no, nothing out there. Next thing you know, there was, he lost his job because of the downturn in the mortgage industry. So he came home, dad what do you do? Well I said you get out there you walk around the estate and knock doors till you get a job.

He did that, he did some waitressing and things like waiter, you know, behind the kitchens, and all that.

And then he got, I’ll go with Azad first, he became, went to Scottish Power Gym, answering phones. And then he worked there and somebody... and he said Daddy this is not good for me, I want to progress. He progressed on to becoming a trainer and a supervisor.

And then he progressed onto, Dad I’m bored, I want to start my own business.
No, you’re moving forward keep going. He met Laura. Laura, two daughters, they’re lovely and they've got a girl of their own. Emma. They’re all my grandchildren not only one.

And, they’ve grown up, Teagan has got a degree. Tally is going on to, she's been accepted by three universities - become a teacher. And by seven, dancing is her... a ballet is her goal. Azad now is head of department, and he's a top boss. They provide him with a car, and he goes all around Great Britain.

And I mean all around Great Britain. And he sells electric to mega. You know, you're talking 40, 40 million has got to come in every year from his team, OK

 

Interview (part 2) with Karim Meghji

 

Perminder: So Karimji, you  came at the age of 12?

Karim: Yeah.

Perminder: What was your first memories of the Tonfanau camp?

Karim: To be honest, shock. Where the hell have I ended up, what is all this about? Confusion because when you went out, the people were fantastic, but they were ignorant as well. The thing was, if you didn't speak Welsh, they started speaking Welsh. And as soon as you walked in, they started speaking Welsh, you were speaking English a second ago, but also confusion, because although I was confused about change of money and things like that, so were they because they were going from what they were before to pounds, shillings and pence, so their currency was changing as well so I was like, whoa, what's going on here, you don't know your own money.

So we were confused, but then going to school and because we had to be... I went to school in Dolgellau, so we had to be shipped and then when you’re on the coach, you know, you shared the coach with English people. And of course, some of them are like, you know, the skinheads would come in and push you around, that sort of thing happened. But, on the, on the main, it was a really good experience the people who were there tried to help you, support you and move you on.

Perminder: So are you saying that you were shipped from the camp to go to a school? Yeah. So you went school on the camp?

Karim: No, no, no, I went to Dolgellau.

Perminder: Could I ask you that again then? So you actually travelled from the camp to school, did you?

Karim: Every morning.

Perminder: If you could incorporate that in your answer.

Karim: Okay. What we did was, well, every morning because there was no room in Tywyn, which was the next one up, quite a large proportion of us joined the school bus which went to Dolgellau, which was about three quarters of an hour run, an hour run every morning. And then we travelled all the way back every evening.

The issues there were there were that there were some quite strong minded skinheads. So whatever you want to call them, you know, with boots on, jeans. Remember we were timid, concerned - what's going on. And this fighting like, okay, grew up in a warzone, but we never seen that sort of thing before and you'd get pushed from moved, from this place and you'd feel like, hey, how dare you talk?

Okay, you'd move. And that just carried on. You'd go into town and people speak in English, and they’d start speaking Welsh. That still happens today, though. I have to be fair, because I go to that area quite often. It was a lovely school to go to. You know, I come away from there thinking, well, hang on, there's more to this.

Perminder: Did you go to the school with other children from the camps?

Karim: Yes, quite a few, we had a bus load.

Perminder: But I went to school with the other children.

Karim: Yeah, I went to school with quite a few, about 20 or 30 of us who caught this bus and went across. But of course, like I said earlier, that we had English boys on there as well and they took the cream of the seats and if you tried to sit next to them or something they’d say, oi, that’s my seat, you know, so you had those comments all the time and you moved on. But then after 6-7 months, I made really good friends there, too. In school, they were really good colleagues. I met some good lady friend, you know, not girlfriends, but females. They were lovely. They came to the camp and had lunch with us and we went to there.

Made some couple of friends, you know, male friends were great. I wish, I only wish I'd taken the names and addresses, but the best thing I met was a farmer's boy. He lived off Tonfanau, there was a farm above Tonfanau Camp, and he lived there. And he used to do a little bit of cleaning in the hospital, where he... let me go once, and that's where I learned how to polish the floors and things like that.

And it was lovely, you know, just talking to somebody who talked to you back in English and you know, we'd be friends and it would have been lovely to keep in touch with him, keep in touch with some of the boys and girls that I met in Tonfanau. But unfortunately, you’re just living like, where am I? I am in no man’s space.

Perminder: What was the life like for your grandparents in the camp? I mean, for your parents.

Karim: My parents tried very hard to support us but because of their age and their understanding and their confusion as well. Because, you know, they were reliant on my uncle, Medi Masa, who was also there to translate, to do everything for them. And unfortunately, because he did everything for them, we ended up in where we did in the valleys, from the valleys. But what I would say to you is that Tonfanau , the people who ran Tonfanau tried everything to support Asian families, you know, they had a couple of leaders who were Asian women who turned around and started to support people, and they were lovely, you know, but I think would have been better to have, a little bit more communication to look at, you know, doing the job I do now, we look at personal need. How can we meet the personal need? And I feel that if I was doing the interview to my, my mum and dad, it would have been with somebody who could speak Gujarati openly and would explain to my mum and dad you know, I remember the comment when we came over the Rhigos, Rhigos is a big mountain in, in the Rhondda, and we came over on the bus to go to where we were going to live in Trebanog.

And my father said, well they said to me it’s flat, where in the name of Allah have they put me. And I was like, you know this is  my dad, you know, this was a man mountain, to me he was a mountain because he was a big guy and I remember those words clearly and you think what are we going to manage this and make the best of what he could.

But that what would have been beneficial, you know, the food, everything, they tried to customise it for the Asian taste. That was lovely. And I, they gave us places where we could socialise. And I think I spent a lot of time in those, the rooms where there was table tennis, you know, the kids running around, and I learnt more then, you know we weren’t alone.

But I was 12. I’m in a different country, let’s have a see what's going on. So it was more excitement. But my parents would have benefit from a Gujarati speaking person, they could have supported them to understand where they’re going. Because once we got to Tonfanau, Medi Masa was also... sorry not Tonfanau, Trebanog, Medi Masa was there, but he soon left and went back, went to Birmingham. So the only connection behind, Medi Masa and Gula Masi had gone. Mum and dad were alone, but thank God Euryn and all these Pen... dress people oh, they were fantastic, you know, but there was a lot of racism, you know, although I fitted in, although I was there, it was a lot, you know, we will turn you upside down, you’ll turn white. Turn me upside down you're going to get your head knocked off because I learned very quickly, one, you either comically laugh your way out of the situation. Two, run -  I got short legs, I ain’t running. Three, I'm going to get beaten up. I know I'm going to get beaten up, but you're going to get a couple of shots from me that you're going to feel the next day.

And all of a sudden I was into rugby, cricket, boxing. They realized that I was, I was only five foot, but I was going to give them a five foot hammering as well. And they realized, I was going to punch back. But even though I built a reputation, I had racism, when I grew from a 12 year old to a teenager there was racism. You know, you couldn't go some places if you did, you know, you get your head kicked in, and things like that. So you are in a position that, you have to protect yourself regularly.

Perminder: What about your parents? Howdid they manage?

Karim: They managed with very broken English, they found it very hard. My grandmother was housebound. My mum was housebound, sorry. And my dad, like men he wasn’t faithful in Uganda. Came to Britain, you got the pub banging, made his own friends and did his own thing. And, he knew one thing, he couldn't raise a hand on my mum again because I was there.

And I would stand up to him whether I was... whether he would give me a beating or not. That's beside the point, that's my mum, you don't touch that woman, you know?

And unfortunately, my dad got cancer while we were there and went from Man Mountain to somebody else carrying him to go to the toilet and support and my sister did quite a lot of that work because she was, she knew what she was doing. But then he passed away and, we were asked to move to Cardiff to be closer to our community and the community to help.

Yeah, the community helped alright! Nothing, we were poor people, we were put in Pentwyn and oh we will pick you up, take you to mosque, we'll take you to Khana, we'll do all this. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Nothing materialised.

 

Interview (part 3) with Karim Meghji

Perminder: So you were saying you faced a lot of racism?

Karim: I think the issue was, yes. As a timid young man, I faced a lot of racism in Wales and going to school, you know, you were isolated. You had a few friends, but not that many. To fit in, I started smoking then keeping with the wrong crowd and then moving on and I realized that  I need to be me as well as be part of you guys. So I started to play rugby, play cricket, play football and box.

Penygraig had a fantastic boxing club and my mentor really did help me learn how to box properly, learn how to do things. And people realized that you could beat me up, not a problem, but I would put a couple of shots in that they would feel the next day.

So if you wanted to pick on me, please do. But you're going to get hurt in the process as well.

And then, you know, I think the reason for me training and getting better was that one, I'm not a comedian, so I can't comic myself away from a fight or whatever was going to happen. Two – I'm a shortass. So running away wasn't an outcome for me. So three I became strong, what you see now is half a version of what you seen. I was 14 stone muscle, all muscle. And I played rugby, and I became faster, stronger. And people knew, you hit him, he’s going to punch you back. You may beat him up, but you're going to feel the punches he’s gonna give you the next day. And that's where I grew up.

 

Interview (part 4) with Karim Meghji

 

We move to Cardiff in Llanedeyrn, which we were told we would be supported and all that. Unfortunately, I think we weren’t supported, and we did what we could in Cardiff because at that time I didn’t have a car I hadn't passed my test or nothing. And the concept was in my mum would be supported, go to mosque and things like that, and you know, never happened. So when I passed my test, my mum and I’d take my mum to the mosque periodically.
And, at that time, of course, I was married to my children’s mother as well. So she was there, and we were trying to raise three kids with, with my mum, who was elderly and infirm. I said, mum, I can't live, I can’t I'm really struggling to manage the family. I have to go back to the Valleys where I know I can make life better for us.

She said, you go back to Cardiff, I'll stay here. So every weekend I used to go to Cardiff and support my mum and everything, but we got to a point where her health was getting down and nobody was coming to support her. So I said, mum, why don't you just move in with me? At that time we were living in Rhiwgarn.

We just got a three bedroom house and I said, mum, come and live with me. I decorated the room the way she likes it and it was lovely. She started coming and stay with me for a couple of days and all that, and she loved it because it was what she was used to, people would come and see her and talk to her you know. But then she had a stroke. And the stroke actually got her into hospital. And she never came out of hospital from there. So she died there, we buried her with my father with all the prayers and everything done. I found that very difficult then because when my father died, I was 14. My parents were buried in Trehafod.  

Perminder: Sorry, do you want to do that again?

Karim: My parents passed away. My grandfather, my father is buried in Trehafod when he died of cancer. Now, at that time, I was 15 years old. And I remember sitting there thinking shit, how am I going to work with this family? How am I going to support my family? I'm 15 years old. I have no idea what to do, but I grew up, I grew up with the support of my friends and the Valley people. And then of course, I met my ex, my then wife who gave me two beautiful children and we moved to Llanedeyrn, stayed in Llanedeyrn as I said before. Then we moved from Llanedeyrn back to the Valleys because there was no support that was promised.

But no matter. I came back to the Valleys and kept going back and forth to support my mum. Eventually, my mum realised that she couldn't cope on her own and with my younger sister Shairoz being there as well. So we moved back and within a very short time while her mum was with me, she had a stroke, went to the hospital in Church Village and then back to the hospital to recover in Porth, Porth’s hospital’s not there but it was there then.

She didn't recover from the stroke, so she had her last rites everything and then she was then buried with my father in Trehafod, where there's still a stone and we all visit regularly, not regular, but periodically. I raised Shairoz then with me and my ex. When Shairoz got to an age, she wanted to leave.

She left and she went to do her own thing, which is fine. And we moved on. We grew up and Azad and Ashifa were born after that. Azad was my mum's eyes because he's a boy and you know Asian families with the boys. My... Claire, who is the daughter of my first wife was her as well.

They called her teapot. Claire was called teapot. And she still goes by the name or teapot and she’s 40, 48, because she'd nick my mum's tea every time. But that was, you know, they all remember those times with my mum. You know? And, they've all grown up now. They all remember the good times they had. And they all respect the family. We’re very strong, my children are very strong with the concept that these are your parents. Whatever happens, you know, Azad comes here and cuts all the grass for me, not downs but the tops.

Ashifa, I’ll talk about Ashifa next. So we've done what we can, we’ve moved on. We are very much a Welsh family, roots are African. African Asian very much. We are African. We are Asians. Would you say our religious? No. Sorry. I believe very strongly in the concept that I used to believe in Africa, which used to happen, you'd go by something called Nandi, which was food that would be taken in by people who could afford to take food in, bought by people who couldn't afford to buy that quality of food, to have a nice meal once a once a day or once a week. And that I believe in very strongly. And the money went into the Jamaat, I believe that strongly, because it helped people, right. It helped me get out of Africa, helped get my parents get out of Africa, Uganda. So I believe in that. But I don't believe in what I see now. And that is when Nandi is taken in Nandi, the food that's taken into the mosque is bought by the rich. It goes for 40 pounds. How can you buy a fish masala for £40? You can make it for less than £6.

But it’s going to £40 pounds, ah it’s going to the Mawla’s house. But that poor student, you've deprived of the poor lady you've deprived of. Why? So as far as I'm concerned, I don't want to... I believe in the philosophy, but I'm not part of it. I'm not part of that greed culture. And that's how my children have been raised. And we do fine, thank you, you know, like I said, Azad’s  progressed now he's the top boss and he goes all around Great Britain, and he’s doing really well.

Perminder: So Karim, I just want to take you back. You said you moved from the Rhondda to Cardiff because it was near the Asian community.

Karim: No.

Perminder: Expecting to get more support from your mum

Karim: Yeah.

Perminder: And then you moved back to the Rhondda because you didn’t get it.

Karim: All right. Okay. I think the issue was that we moved to Pentwyn because my mother had been promised support, and she believed that they would support but it never materialized. And nobody came to see her. Nobody came and spoke to her. So, and her health deteriorated.

I had to come back to the Valleys for my sanity and my survival. I asked my mum constantly come and live with me. You know, I've got no problem. And my ex was quite clear, she wants to come and live, that’s fine. And she did. But she had a stroke and she passed away after that stroke.

Perminder: Well how did the Valley support you?

Karim: It's a community. Yeah, the Valleys community is very strong. We went back to Trehafod, didn’t go anywhere back to where we came in the 1970s, ‘72, and we still had that community there which supported me, which supported my family, which supported my mother. My mother was, knew these people, knew the culture and knew their ways. And they'd pop in for a cup of tea. So they’re going down the road, they'd pop in and say how you doing.

Athat's what it's about, nobody did that in Cardiff, nobody.
We are loving, we’re caring – not you bloody were not. But that’s fine, that’s fine.

She passed on and I have to be thankful to the community, Ismaili Community because they came, they helped do the burial rituals, they did what needed to be done, which I'm grateful for and I'll always be grateful for.

Perminder: What memories do you have of Uganda?

Karim: I've got fond memories of growing up in Uganda. You know, where I grew up. I grew up in a place called  Kasenyi, which is a very deprived area. And, behind us was the bush, the jungle. Saturdays were volleyball days. So, we'd set up the tents for... my dad used to play volleyball and all that. And then dads weren’t playing volleyball on the ground that we cleared, we'd be playing catch, you know, touch and run and all that.

So lovely memories. And of course, we'd also have lake Kabaka, you know, I came to Britain as a fisherman. I love fishing still, but in Africa we'd go fishing, which would be a bamboo stick, a piece of line, a Coke from the local bar, a hook and some worms which we dug up from a stream and we'd be fishing.

We'd come home with about whatever fish we had, and we shared it between the family and the whoever  wanted it.

That's the sort of lifestyle, it was lovely. You know, my father was a milkman. My mother sold milk at home in a little shop in the living room where she sat and did her business, and it was finer, we progressed really well and Dad became rich himself and wanted to become more so he became a taxi driver. Then he got quite a few taxis and, but he wasn't a businessman, and we lost it, we lost everything.

Interview (part 5) with Karim Meghji

 

Perminder: Okay, so you were saying that, you know, you remember waiting in the long queues, for your visa?

Karim: I think what I will say to you is my memories of the long queues are horrendous because you’re 12 years old, you're looking around you and there’s an army with guns around you and they're pushing you pulling and literally hitting people when they want to. Which is quite concerning because you're 12, you're frightened to death. You've got to stand there and you’re not talking about standing there for a couple of hours during the day, it was my night shift. I used to stand there from 8 p.m. in the night till 9 a.m. in the morning when my father, my father, came over, or Mehdi Masa came over and my dad and they took my place and then I went home to sleep. So I was there all night on my own, sitting there looking at army, people I don't even know, kids trying to sell their places to other people, people jumping queues.

And I'm like, oh my God, you're frightened. And especially you seen the guns going off and all that and curfew. And of course, you've seen the genocide that's gone on. So you really fearful. And I'm 12 years old, so I'm like, oh, and now they call it PTSD, fine -  put a label on it, but do something about it because it's still going on.

My difficulty was I was a young lad, grew up in a zone. I was the eldest son, so I was the one who was doing it. Those are the past. That's where I grew up watching that. And I think the example again, once we once we passed that got our visas to go, what happened?

We’re at Entebbe Airport sitting there, there was my pride and joy - I had a radio and it worked wonderfully you know. And of course, the batteries run dry. So what do you do? You take the batteries out, rub, rub, rub, hopefully put them back in and they work and they worked.

What happens? I'm sitting there, 12 year old with guns in my head. I'm like well what are you play at? Somebody from our community had reported to army that I had opened the case from the bottom of my radio and I put something in there, I was hiding something because they thought I, you know, jewellery and all that, Asian people are trying to get stuff out. We had no money, we had nothing so. I had to dismantle that radio for this army people to look inside. And everywhere. You're talking, a 12 year old kid who's sitting away from his family, everybody. Some told and literal guns pointing in my face, and I'm like, ah, whoa, and I still...

And, you know, to this day, the experience, I mean, I’m 66 years old, I'm a graduate. I fill forms in every day. To this day, I am frightened of the passport office that's in Great Britain. Not in Africa. In Britain.