The taxi passenger

London June 2002

Five boys are about to cross the road. One goes; another hesitates, and then turns back. The other three pretend they are about to go then stand back bending over as if they are falling sick. All start laughing, as if unaware of us the impatient waiting infuriated drivers. They are around eleven, twelve years old.

“Been there,” your passenger says

“Yeah”

“When you are that age you think you know everything”

“Sure”

“That’s a long time ago”

“How long?” you ask curiously, suddenly forgetting the laughing jeering kids.

“I came to this country when I was twenty. Now I am 46.”

“26 years?”

He nods.

“You have been that long in the UK?”

“When we came here Africans were a novelty. People would call you Shaka Zulu in your face. You just accepted it”

“That was the 70’s right?”

“Yes. I remember once I hadn’t had a screw for two months. I was tired of wanking. I was used to have sex at least twice a week back home in Sierra Leone. So I go to this club with two other Sierra Leonese. They used to call them “ghettos”…there would be James Brown, Reggae, Osibisa music. And a few white girls would come in. They had “heard” from their friends how big African cocks were.”

Laughs.

“Big ?”

“Wait. Wait. Wait. These days women experiment a lot sleeping with different guys comparing notes – using you to recharge their relationships”

“Oh, sure” you say reflecting on the London reality . Relationships are always sore and people’s attitudes are at a boiling edge, ready to blow, ready to break, the scourge of “independence” and madness colouring the era.

My passenger is blowing on:

“One of those early nights in London I was standing watching the dancers, sipping my beer, I recall that moment distinctly, because a Donna Summer song was on and I was in a good mood. Then this blonde called Jane comes over and says: ”Want to dance?” It was that nice man. And off we went to the floor.

Ah, Love to Love baby…

Ah love to love baby…

Remember Donna Summer? She was the Kylie Minogue of the day. Were you old enough to enjoy like we did?”

You nod, still driving.

“Jane is smiling, we are on the floor, soon she is buying me beers. My pals are looking at me with envy. Like I said those days we were regarded as animals, only good for bed, we didn’t do any good jobs, nor had much money and cars like you are driving me now, you understand what I am saying? So the women felt they had to buy you stuff. And they were not as offensive as they are now. After all you were going to pay it back later, right?”

“Sure. Go, on…”

“Next thing, I am in a car. Next thing I am in her house. Next thing we are fucking all over the place. I pumped that blonde like she was a punctured tyre man. She needed it badly. I think I must have been, if not her first black man maybe the second. On the sofa, floor, kitchen, shower. Three days I and her lived like we were on honey moon.”

“Weren’t you working?”

“I used to work, cleaning toilets at some college in South London. I just phoned my supervisor and told her I was sick. They knew I was not well. I had been tortured by soldiers back home so they just believed me. I still had these horrible scars in my legs”

Indeed , you recall the era of Siaka Stevens in the 70’s. Was he in an opposition party?

“No, I had just helped some friends in a student demonstration. One thing led to another, arrests were made and you know how it is in Africa. No questions asked, no trial, just beatings. One of the prison guards was a former boyfriend of my aunt. I managed to escape. I don’t think he got into trouble because I was not a big fish”

“What about Jane?”

“So we are on our fourth day. Sex has been a bit difficult. She is getting sore…what you call it?”

“Cystitis?”

“Is that when a woman has difficulties peeing because your dick is too big and they can’t pee properly?”

“Something like that..”

“Anyway, on my fourth day, I am seated in the living room, chilling, listening to her music. She had this large collection of black music: Motown especially. She is in the bedroom, lying down…and there is a car blowing horns, outside!”

“Horns, for what?”

“I mean sirens, not horns!”

“Police?”

“Yes. And her father, brothers…two brothers”

“Waaaw!”

“They claimed I have been molesting her. No, molesting is a word used these days. They said brainwashing and corruption of her mind”

You are speechless.

“So what happened?”

“Of course I was arrested, put in a cell, then released two days and warned never to go near her again”

“Did you ever see her again?”

“I can’t tell you”

He bursts out laughing.

“Remember” he says, “It was pure lust. She was actually seeing a very respectable man, a wealthy white man, and she just wanted to try out niggers, and do you want to know what I think now?”

You would like to know

“Nothing much has changed”

“At least you don’t get arrested for sleeping with a white woman”

“Its not that simple”

You tell him you once saw this graffiti in a Scandinavian toilet some years ago.

Someone had scribbled in huge black crayon:

Africans go home

Someone else counter-attacked:

But your mothers and sisters need us

We are slowly reaching Brixton Hill where the passenger lives. He guides you slowly to his house. As he pays for the taxi ride he finalises:

“In the 80’s AIDS stormed over , more Africans came and they blamed us for bringing in the epidemic. They said we sleep around like flies”

Not 'the pleasure' anymore?

“Sure. Instead of the fascination, you have the accusation”

Mmmh.

“Whatever we do we are going to receive the stick”

Mmmh.