To the Place Where I Belong...

I’m making good on the promise to visit the UK more often.  Two months after my last London adventure, I’m back in Blighty.  My senior manager, Lucia begrudgingly grants my leave request, despite me having chosen one of the least disruptive moments.  In France, there are several public holidays during May; two of them will take place whilst I’m away. I don’t work on Mondays. I’ve cleared it with colleagues and my line managers…and yet Lucia makes me jump through another administrative hoop before she approves the request. When she refers to the leave I’m contractually entitled to as a potential ‘inconvenience’, I am livid. It’s indicative of the strained atmosphere of late.

Thank God for mum and sis’ recent visit and this London trip.   I mix-up my itinerary with a flight from Basel to Gatwick, to return to Strasbourg by train via St. Pancras the following week.  Sis and I overlap on my first night in town. Before heading to see her and mum, I drop my luggage off at Uncle Lenny’s in Shooter’s Hill. He and his step-daughter, Stassi have kindly offered me one of their spare rooms. The digs are clean and capacious with two bathrooms and lounges.  Stassi and Lenny are also very generous with their food. I make sure to do my own shopping as not to take advantage of their hospitality.

Sis is due to fly back to Japan the following morning. It’s a short and sweet visit owing to the late hour. I’m famished on arrival. I can count on mum for some decent grub. Sis hands over a Milky Bar Easter Egg and mum shows me the electronic pump for my wayward airbed that she found at Tesco's for a steal. 

The following day, I decide to stay local. I dutifully visit a trying relative only to wonder if the greater evil wasn’t avoiding another frustrating conversation full of vagaries and baseless assertions.  It doesn’t bring out my better self. I phone to apologise afterwards for not being a better listener. 
I have other plans that afternoon that go to the wall, having stayed longer than I should.

The next day begins more promisingly. My hair treatment at Shooter’s Hill College Beauty Salon (recommended by auntie J) goes very well. I am particularly appreciative of the one-to-one consultation. I'm a little apprehensive to have a European stylist handling my frizz but she does a good job, under the supportive but watchful eye of supervisor, Jen (of Nigerian extraction). That afternoon, my hairdresser auntie Femi’s nimble fingers make light work of my kinky twists.  In spite of my morning appointment running over, I’m now ahead of schedule to meet long time friend Bunmi in Brixton. Whilst I wait, I rock down Electric Avenue searching in vain for my favourite liquid foundation.

Bunmi and I have one of those friendships in which we drive each other round the bend as much as we do the other good.  This evening is no exception. She’s brutally frank; whether paying a compliment or otherwise. She builds some of the confidence that I have lost after the latest episodes at work, only to annoy me with her comments about my new auburn highlights (which everyone else loves by the way) or scepticism about Extinction Rebellion or criticism of Jeremy Corbyn’s honourable stance on the planned Trump state visit (she needs to pay less attention to the MSM).  She really gets my goat when she vehemently defends R. Kelly in light of the damning case against him and his apparent lack of remorse.  Bunmi can be generous to a fault. It’s one thing to try and see things from all angles; to question the validity of the court of public opinion. It’s quite another to downplay unconscionable behaviour or indulge in victim blaming; or justify male entitlement using dubious evolutionary biological theory; or believe that the law can always be trusted to do the right thing; or claim that every successful black man who's indicted is innocent by virtue of their ethnicity and is merely a pawn in a grand conspiracy theory. I almost fall off my chair when she posits that there are circumstances when a relationship with a minor would be legit. What about abuse of power and trust? Embedded power structures? Grooming?

I would have expected more from you, she laments.

I could say the same. I knew she’d make excuses for Kelly but not to this extent.  I have a sense of how Tom Dubois felt like trying to take on such skewed logic. Unlike him however, I won’t let this Riley Freeman win the argument. The conversation haunts me for days. I question why I'm taking it so personally. Yes, I care about justice and gender equality. But I know how intoxicating it is to want to be right. This shouldn't be about my ego.

Thankfully, the rest of the week is much more edifying.  I spend time in the company of yummy mummy friends and their tots; running around parks or pretending to eat play-dough pastries.  Afropean editor-in-chief, Jonny Pitts makes a surprise cameo at Rich Mix when I meet with co-editor Nat. I pop down to Aldgate East to hang out with rapper mate Ré at his day job in a plush cinema. We don’t get much quality time. The new Avengers film has taken over his schedule. That franchise pops up in a number of my conversations during my visit. En route to my next appointment, I enjoy an impromptu all-and-sundry chat with a natural-haired chocolate queen whose adorable baby boy I have been gushing over earlier. That evening, I catch-up with my old French tutor, Grégoire, after a two-year face-to-face hiatus. It’s some well needed language practice. The following afternoon, I learn about the mechanics of horror movie tropes from articulate cinephile and photographer David Mensah.

In the aftermath of the terror attack in Sri Lanka over Easter, I dare to debate the definition of persecution in the context of Christian minorities with intellectual giant Vinoth Ramachandran who also happens to be in town that weekend. Yusef Slim and I discuss militant veganism and the ethics of purging the music of fallen icons from our playlists. It’s especially meaningful that he’s made the effort to see me. He’s just received some shocking news about a friend.  As I am to learn days later, the story has a positive outcome. Thank God.

My pretty Brixton boy Samuel explains his own (more considered) reservations about Extinction Rebellion, why he’s a ‘virulently anti-Zionist’ Jew and I tentatively put forward my theory on why Nigeria has never had a socialist revolution. I have an especially meaningful conversation with one of my London pastors about isolation and meet up once more with Pete and Amelia after service. (She notes how I refer to her by pseudonym on these very pages.)

Not to mention the meet-ups with auntie J, erstwhile Uni friends or former CLP comrades. I talk to church friend, Nic about what it’s like being a new mum.  I chat with uncle Lenny into the wee small hours of the morning  about faith, relationships and the dearth of men in church. In between that I regularly popping round to see mum and catch-up on BBC iPlayer viewing I can't access in France (Songs of Praise, how I've missed thee). Then there are the many serendipitous encounters; such as bumping into one of my pastors whilst he's celebrating his birthday with his young family; or the poet acquaintance that I haven’t seen in so long, he has had a five-year-old son in the interim. Or the spiritual seeker who used to visit my church and is surprised that I remember his name.

Soundtrack: Space Cries + Left My Heart by Ed Mount