Charity shop will coin it!
I love Santa, but there are times when I really want to kick him hard in his sack.
Why does he have to pick toys which involve massive parental involvement?
Take my daughter’s chocolate-coinmaker – this was the one thing Amara wanted and to her delight she got one. She hounded me every day for a week to help her to make a coin.
I eventually agreed and after a very messy struggle and a few “oh f…or sugar’s sake” we managed to pop out a very squishy, ill-wrapped, paper-thin chocolate coin.
She was as proud as punch. I was left thinking: “That’s going to the charity shop next week!”
This year has kicked off with good news for my family, as my sister Sadi proudly revealed that she has been awarded an MBE for her services to cultural and religious awareness and work with vulnerable women.
I was bursting with pride because if anyone ever deserved recognition for perserverance in the face of adversity it is her. She has overcome domestic violence in an arranged marriage, divorce and cancer, and is now a successful businesswoman and charity fundraiser, a single mum and a true role model.
This honour means a lot to her, and to our family. But it’s also a victory for every immigrant of my parents’ generation.
They came to the UK in the 1960s to better their lives by working hard in any jobs they could get while ensuring that their children took advantage of every opportunity.
My dad died in 1998 so sadly he’s not here to see his daughter’s remarkable achievement.
But I am sure that when she goes up to collect her award, she will pinch herself knowing that he came to this country with £10 in his pocket, slogged away in factories and suffered discrimination, but kept his head down in order to give his children life chances that he and my mum could only dream of.
Sadi will stand in front of royalty in a palace – a girl raised with three siblings in a two-up, two-down terrace where her parents slept on a mattress in the front room.
When they finally got a council house after 10 years, our parents thought they’d won the lottery because they had a bedroom of their own and a garden for us kids to play in.
As that medal making her a Member of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is pinned to her chest, she’ll be thinking: “I can’t believe I’m here, a single mum, without any fancy connections, just a hard-working lass from Derbyshire.”
While nearly all our friends and family congratulated us, I did get one comment from a relative who said: “Well, if she really knew what an MBE means she would have refused it. Who wants to celebrate the empire? As an Asian I wouldn’t.”
My immediate reaction was to write it off as jealous, bitter and sad.
But it stayed with me and got me thinking about people who turned down honours and why.
So I did a bit of research and was pretty taken aback by my findings.
The list includes TV journalist Jon Snow, film director Danny Boyle, David Bowie, comedy stars French and Saunders and rock hero Paul Weller. Reasons ranged from “I don’t care much for it” to “there are people more worthy”. But among those from ethnic minorities who refused or returned the honours – like writer Yasmin Alibhai Brown and poet Benjamin Zephaniah – the thinking was summed up by footballer Howard Gayle when he said his “ancestors would turn in their graves after empire and colonialism enslaved them”.
But while it may up their street cred, is accepting or refusing an honour going to make much difference to their already successful lives? In saying “yep, I was honoured, but I turned it down”, are they not trying to have it both ways?
OK, the honours system needs to change. It could do with banging on less about ‘empire’ and focusing less on the powerful and well connected.
We must learn the lessons of colonialism and look forward – not back in anger.
For me and my family, my sister’s MBE says: “The empire strikes back.”
Big congrats to my mentor Eamonn Holmes on his OBE. From humble beginnings in Belfast he’s now made it to national treasure. I hope he had a few pints of “gat” to celebrate.