The Crazy Nigerian

I'm allergic to the N word

The ratio of white people to black people in Plymouth at the time I started university was about one thousand to one (and that is being conservative). When my dad and I arrived at the Plymouth train station from London, I immediately felt like an alien. Little did I know that in a few months I would feel like a trespassing alien.

In my first week at Plymouth, I counted no more than four black people, including myself. The other three were also students, two of whom were in my course. One was Tanzanian and the other was Ghanaian. I met the Tanzanian when I went to the finance office to pay my school fees. He was the spitting image of Abdul Kareem from the Bruce Lee movie 'Game of Death'. With him towering at about six feet six inches, I couldn't help feeling like a midget as I stood next to him (well, maybe I exaggerated and added a few inches, thanks to his gigantic afro). I had to tilt my head upwards at about forty-five degrees just to look at him. He dressed in black from top to bottom and had the intimidating voice of Mufasa in Disney's Lion King. Did I also mention he had biceps the size of lunchboxes? Definitely not a guy I was planning to make fun of, just in case he had no sense of humour. I met the Ghanaian after my first ever introductory lecture. He approached me, and we exchanged brief life histories, some of which I won't bore you with because I've already narrated mine (so I'll bore you with his instead). He was born in London and had lived there for most of his life. He was in his mid-twenties, unmarried and had no plans of going to Ghana except to visit his mum and sister. He loved books by Shakespeare and also had a peculiar habit of quoting parts of Caesar during conversations (and I thought I was weird).

I also made friends with a few varieties of white folk: those who seemed curious to learn about black people; those whom I felt had a better grasp of some of the course modules than I did; and those whom I had absolutely no choice to avoid because of compulsory group tasks. During one such task, I was grouped with two guys and two girls. One of the guys, a curly blonde-haired rugby type, was obviously not comfortable with my inclusion in the group-for no known reason. The task assigned to all the groups in my class was to design a Plymouth-themed Monopoly game and pitch it to 'the board' for subsequent production. There was no limit to our imagination, but there was a deadline: two days. After I introduced myself as 'Tony' to the group, we had the shortest meeting in history. It lasted about three minutes. I don't recall a leader being appointed amongst us, but the Big Blondie took charge by force (kind of like Gadhafi). Without seeking anyone else's opinion, he stated what he wanted to do, although he didn't assign responsibilities to anyone in particular. We needed pictures for our board game, so we set out on a sightseeing trip to take photos, which turned out to be one of the most awkward experiences I've ever had. Hardly anyone spoke, and when they did it certainly wasn't directed my way. The girls took pictures of landmarks as we toured the city centre and the seaside, but near the end of our trip there was just one problem: we had taken less than ten pictures. I felt we needed at least twenty-two in order to put a picture on each step around on the board game we were to create. However, all my suggestions were criticized and ignored by the Big Curly Blondie.

When we dispersed, we agreed to meet in the late afternoon the following day. Why so late? We had nothing else to do since the course was based mostly on 'open learning', which equated to nine hours of lectures a week and gave us ample time for personal study. My group was a lazy bunch (probably because they knew the assignment wasn't going to be assessed). I, on the other hand, didn't like doing poorly on anything, so I was rather disappointed that, in the end, my 'team' (which the Big Curly Blondie obviously spelt with an 'I') wasn't among the top three with the best Monopoly board game. The group with the Tanzanian won that task.

I never learned what was eating the Big Curly Blondie, but I often wondered what side of whose bed he had been sleeping on for the last twenty years. Come to think of it, I'd be pretty pissed too if my surname had 'Dork' in it.

But that experience wasn't half as bad as the one involving a passing vehicle filled with a gang of young lads, one of whom shouted the word 'Nigger' as I strolled into one of the local supermarkets. At first I was humiliated, because there were others in the street who would have heard it. And then there was the denial-could that remark really have been directed at me? (Duh! I was the only black person within a mile at the time). Inside the supermarket, I went blank . . . I couldn't remember what it was I came to buy. Later, the paranoia set in. I started feeling as if every white person had the N word on their mind each time I popped up from around a corner. Thoughts like, 'Uh oh! There's that nigger again!', 'What's that nigger doing here?', and 'Where's the Klu Klux Clan when you need them?' all came to mind.

My self-esteem dropped-so much so that it weighed my head down and I could no longer look people in the eye with confidence. I didn't want to tell my parents, because I didn't need them fretting all the way in Nigeria. I became withdrawn. I had spent less than a month in Plymouth and I was feeling homesick already. We're talking about a guy who had a curfew back home of 9 p.m. but could party in Plymouth till 2 a.m.

I talked to my Ghanaian friend about it, and he told me not to worry about the incident. He told me that only ignorant cowards would say something offensive in a moving vehicle. I felt better after talking to him. I stopped caring about what people said and swore I wouldn't let words bring me down. I was playing Elton John's 'I'm Still Standing' in my head to help get me through this ego-crushing ordeal (yeah, yeah, yeah!).

Back in class, I made sure I clearly reiterated the objectives of any assignments given to my miserable group . . . to Big Curly Blondie's disgust. I also encouraged suggestions and ensured we didn't deviate from the course leader's expectations. In a sense, I managed to give them a subtle taste of teamwork. We got C grades in the end, but my joy was that in our second year, we would get to choose who we wanted to work with and not necessarily be mandated to work with specific students (so long, Big Curly Blondie!). P.S., I sure hope he stumbles upon this part of my book on Google once I publish the E-book version . . . Muhahaha!