When my friend returned from his long sojourn in the Southern Hemisphere, the bulk of which was spent on the small island of Tanna, Vanuatu (which hosts the people mostly famous for worshipping Prince Phillip as a deity) he found that he had been so readily accepted, embraced into the community that he was considered just as much a ‘black man’ as any other.
Three weeks in London where my time off was spent doing the Telegraph Crossword in the pub, going to the Proms, buying classical music CDs and visiting the British Museum didn’t, I must admit didn’t leave me with quite the same feeling, but it is a bit of a truism that one doesn’t need to travel to the South Pacific anymore to find oneself quite outside one’s own culture. I must admit I was a little nervous of working in an area like Manor Park, Newham. It’s a fairly diverse sort of area, now largely inhabited by Muslim populations, but you have people from all over in significant numbers, there are Sikhs and Hindus, Catholics from Africa and the West Caribbean, more than a few Far East Asians and some Eastern European migrants. More than I could identify with my limited experience. In the lunch hall local primary school, St. Winifred’s, there’s a flag for every nationality represented there. There were about 30 flags. As a white, middle-class, Anglican I am a triple-minority in this area; as I wander the street noticing the absence of pubs and the superabundance of halal fried-chicken places, walking past ladies in hijabs and niqabs, men in turbans and so on I couldn’t help but become profoundly aware of just how much I probably stood out in the streets.
It’s also a poor area with crime problems. In the house I was staying at, my neighbours to the right didn’t seem to have any job at all, whilst those to the left were trying to raise three kids in a pokey two-bedroom flat, the streets were busy with pedestrians in the middle of the day, you could get a mug of tea for less than a quid (I think) Cans of coke were 50p. On the penultimate day there was a police cordon round a smashed up phone box and some strewn items and a policeman on guard. I saw a lady get mugged in broad daylight from a first floor window. Apart from that, Green space (at least until you cross over to the north of the Romford road, a three mile stretch urban hell, resplendent with the grumble of ever-clogged traffic, cracked pavement and the stink of fumes) is at a premium and as a zone 3/4 border station, Oyster fares can be horrendous. It’s not the sort of place one goes to if one really has much choice in the matter.
Nevertheless they do, and lots of them at that. And I must admit, I did worry about just how these residents were going to take this white Oxbridge kid who had come in for a mere month to ‘help’ them a philanthropic sentimental tourist. Inevitably I was warmly welcomed wherever I went, be it the Catholic Parish I was working in, the Anglican church over the road, the school next door, the Hindu Temple in the neighbouring street, all ages and ethnicities. Quite honestly, if it weren’t for the pace of life and the general London surliness (something I never really got to grips with) actually building community in a place like this seems a complete doddle.
Which was just wonderful, despite very obviously being an ‘outsider’ and deliberately so, I couldn’t help, by the end of three weeks, to feel that I really had found a context for myself, I wasn’t simply a welcomed guest, I actually had a role, and a purpose to fulfil, in common with others. Which, as a Student can be a remarkable feeling, when one gets used to spending most ‘working time’ in isolation, and spending free time flitting between different activities and social groups, often with bonding being a matter of alcohol and bad dancing, and the individual becoming very self-absorbed and caught up in idle talk much of the time, so to suddenly feel remotely useful is quite a liberating feeling in many respects. The job has been therapeutic in other ways as well, I think I’ve managed to shed some of my middle class race anxiety issues, which can only be a good thing! Living in a predominantly white world, I always felt ill at ease trying to define them (I was unfortunately born with a swollen PC gland) and definitely felt like I could never really speak on their behalf in an argument. And now? Well, a spade’s a spade I suppose, and I shouldn’t be afraid of that. It’s ridiculous, and seeing how they acknowledge my background, but pay no real heed to it has shown me that it is far from impolite to return that in kind. Ultimately I can say that within this concrete mire I have in fact re-discovered a sense of faith in humanity and their capacities to do good towards each other. To see these people, working hard to improve their lot, embracing what they do have and one another is quite an edifying experience for the isolated student. Of course the community is huge in terms of numbers so there’s much in the way of building a network to be done but I think it could well succeed here. And if it can succeed in this rough and ready, often down and out and variegated community, then I think it can, with a little effort be done anywhere.
When I asked the director of the Contextual Theology Centre about the place, he said that for all its faults, some of his happiest years in ministry were spent there. I perhaps have an inkling of why. I don’t think I shall forget the place, and many of the people in a hurry.
