“You from Trinidad! But you not half-caste!”

“I’m sorry?”

Walking out of Brixton tube station and into the rain, my forlorn pink umbrella, long conquered by the wind, hanging uselessly by my side.

“Excuse me miss!”

The voice, polite and distinctly not English, cut through the insistent chorus of skunkweedtravelcardsgetyourhighgrade.

I paused. An older man, in his 60s, and dressed in the fashion of the dapper older man, smiled at me, umbrella extended in greeting. “No sense in getting the locs wet. Come, I walk you to the bus stop.”

“You are very kind,” I said, awkwardly, guiltily thrusting one hand into my pocket to check that my wallet was still there.

“You from Trinidad! But you not half-caste!”

“I’m sorry?” I said, deafened by the wind and the rain and Brixtonian confusion.

“You not half-caste – you know, dougla, mixed!”

“Oh! Oh, yes, haha!”

There was my bus, there was I stammering out the usual explanation, taken aback by the phrase, wondering at the implications.

“Thank you, that was very kind.”

I ran.

Continue reading Young and black in Babylondon: part three →