Under Nelson Mandela Boulevard

by Sean Christie

  By December 1999, he was also learning Nigerian pidgin from a Lagosian called Felicia, who had employed him to fry chicken and chips in her takeaway restaurant in Walsall.

  ‘I worked in that chippy until I understood the streets of Birmingham. Felicia wanted me to stay working but it was not for me, to be honest, frying chips all day, so one morning I took all the money in the till and walked out and bought some ganja with it. The Jamaican dealers knew I arrived on a ship with nothing so they didn’t get jealous, they let me hustle. They used to call me Afro Boy, short for African boy. They adopted me, I think I can say that.’

  Selling marijuana had enabled Adam to rent a squalid room from a Jamaican dealer. He spent most of his free time in Ladbrokes, ‘betting horses, football, roulette, even dogs’.

  Adam’s other major pastime had been riding buses – his way of exploring the new environment. In Hull, he had been afraid to go outside. In Birmingham, he’d made up for months of confinement.

  ‘I remember the routes like it was yesterday,’ he said. ‘The 79 was my main bus, the Birmingham to Wolverhampton. The 74 was Birmingham to Dudley and the 55 was Birmingham to Walsall. I met Rochelle on the 79.’

  Rochelle and her cousin Lisa had clambered aboard the 79 one afternoon in early 2000. Adam was sitting in his usual position, in the middle of the back row, when they came up the steps.

  ‘They were also bus riders,’ he said. ‘They would just get on and go anywhere, just to see what was going to happen. I remember Rochelle came and pushed past my knees and sat next to the left window. She said hullo but that was all. Her friend sat in the seat in front and turned to talk. She said, “Do you like me?” I said, “No, but I like your friend.” Rochelle just smiled and kept looking out the window. I didn’t have a phone at that time so I went all over the bus looking for a pen so I could take her number. Nobody ’ad one, so I lost her.’

  Adam had bumped into Lisa several more times on the buses, but never Rochelle. One morning, with nothing better to do, he had bought and downed a half-jack of Russian Bear vodka before boarding the 79. He usually stepped off at Wolverhampton, but had decided on a whim to get out at West Bromwich; the moment he gathered his senses, he’d spotted Rochelle and her cousin in a phone booth.

  ‘I had a phone by this time so I went straight to Rochelle and said, “Put your number please.” She put it in. I said, “Okay, see you later, I’ll call you.”’

  Adam had wanted to call her that afternoon, but he didn’t have enough cash for airtime. A week had gone by and every time he’d thought of calling Rochelle, which was every other minute, he’d found some reason to put it off. In the meantime, he’d picked a young man’s pocket on the 79 and come away with another phone.

  ‘At that time people called that type of phone a 3, because it was a phone, a camera and it played music. I saw there was airtime, so I called Rochelle. She said, “Who this?” I said, “Adam.” She said, “I’m not your baby no more, you never called me until now, whatever happened to you?” I said I was sorry, and then I explained the truth of myself. I told her I was a stowaway boy from Africa, with no documents at all. I described how me and Dawoodi came to the Global Victory through the forest in South Africa. She felt sad for me. She said, “You make me cry, bwoy.”’

  They had made a plan to meet the next morning at the McDonald’s on Holyhead Road. It was, said Adam, a compromise venue, ‘halfway from the ghetto areas of Handsworth and the nice part of West Brom, where Rochelle lived with her mother and stepdaddy.’

  The meeting had gone well. Adam had talked again of his childhood, telling Rochelle about his absent father and troubled relationship with his mother. Rochelle had said that her father had also been absent most of her life.

  ‘We became friends after that, meeting up nearly every day to talk.’

  After a year, Rochelle had agreed to go on a date with Adam in the Winson Green area. They slept together for the first time that day, in Adam’s squat.

  ‘On the second day she saw me again, and the day after that she came with her mum and her stepfather and said, “I done speak to me mum and you’re going to stay with us. Pack your stuff, we going.” I said, “Fair play,” and we jumped in her mum’s car, a Ford Focus two-door, and went back to West Brom and put my things in her room. That was my new life. Before I had to take a bus to get to my corner but now I could walk there in five minutes.’

  Adam’s living conditions may have improved, but the new situation had come with its challenges. He still had to hustle by day. When Rochelle’s stepfather had learnt of this, he had started supplying Adam with high-quality skunk – ‘real Dutch stuff’ – in greater quantities than Adam was used to moving.

  ‘Before, I would sell maybe a quarter ounce a day, just enough to live, but now I was selling an ounce or two, even supplying some of the other hustlers and having enough left to sell two or three hens myself.’

  ‘What’s a hen?’

  ‘It’s what South Africans call a stop. A small section of maybe one or two grams.’

  Adam would make anything between £50 and £100 a day. If he was having a good week at the bookies, his roll of cash could grow to £2 000 or more. With Rochelle’s help, he had sent money back to his mother and elder half-brother. He had visited a tattoo parlour and had a nautical wheel inscribed on the back of his right hand. He had visited a jeweller and had gold caps fashioned and applied to his incisors. But he found that he was not nearly as happy as he had been in his first years in Birmingham.

  ‘Rochelle’s stepdaddy was always cussin’ me, always trying to control me. Even his own daughter – because he had two daughters with Rochelle’s mum – said, “Watch out, he will try to bully you.” He even told me I should leave Rochelle and go stay by him. I didn’t like that and neither did Rochelle, so we moved to a small house in Dudley and I left him and went back to work for myself.’

  The split had left Adam in a quandary, because he could not go back to selling inferior weed on Soho Road without suffering serious reputation damage. To get by, he had started breaking into homes in his new neighbourhood, gaining access by sliding a skinny arm through the mail slot and turning the Yale locks.

  ‘I got a big camera from this one house, where the guy had a small weed plant in his office. Another time I opened the door and saw a stack of £20 notes on the sofa, like they had been left there for me.’

  Adam had also started selling crack cocaine and abusing alcohol, especially after he’d learnt that Rochelle was pregnant.

  ‘I was happy for her, but I also felt bad in my own self. When I was a boy I swore I would never give a child a life like mine. Me and Rochelle used to talk about what we gonna do to raise that baby but in my mind I already knew I was going to go down sometime, and that she would be left alone. Maybe not tomorrow but sometime, because I ’ad no status.’

  And there’d been something else. Although he was no longer in contact with Rochelle’s stepfather, he’d felt the man’s rage all around him, like a curse searching for the right moment. To him, this curse was as real as the air he was breathing. What else could explain the fact that 16-year-old Brummies were suddenly harassing him on Soho Road, when for years he had experienced no troubles? He had been jumped on the 79, and had narrowly escaped arrest after a fight had broken out on the pavement.

  In 2007, he had smoked heroin for the first time. It had made him sick but he’d smoked again the next day and felt wonderful, at peace with the world. Rochelle was seven months pregnant, healthy and happy.

  ‘When I smoked everything was clear,’ said Adam, ‘and the truth was I felt bad because I hadn’t spoken to my mother for seven years. We were fighting when I left for South Africa but I was a boy then, and in England I became a man. I could see her struggles in a new way and I forgave her everything. I had to make peace with ’er, I knew that. I was going to call ’er that week but before I could do it I got nicked for dealing
in the city centre.’

  Adam had been charged with possession of a Class A substance and held for the weekend. After he had been released on bail, his fellow dealers on Soho Road had advised him to avoid his court date in a month’s time.

  ‘They said, “The police don’t know who you are, Afro bwoy. You’re not in the system, so never go back there again.” But to be honest I was tired of life on the streets. If I could have had a decent job then fine, but all I could do was keep hustling. That is not life, not really. So I went back to court, and they told me to go and sign in with the immigration officer. I told this guy straight: “My name is Daniel Solomon Belete from Ethiopia, and I’m seeking asylum.” He gave me the asylum forms to fill out and then he said, “Tomorrow you’re going to court. They will give you bail and after that we will give you accommodation.” I told him, “Fair play,” but before I left his office I put my fingerprints in his computer. Five minutes later he came to my cell and said, “Adam, why you fucking around, man?” He found my details in the computer. Holland, Germany and the UK share a system, you see, and in Rotterdam I gave my name and my story, and this officer saw everything.’

  Adam had posted bail the next day, but had been instructed to sign in at the immigration office in nearby Solihull every Thursday until his next court date in another month. He had made the trip only once, and it had cost him.

  ‘When I went back to court, the judge set another court date for two months’ time. He was about to let me go when he read a paper in my file telling him that I had not been visiting Solihull. He said, “Mr Adam, you did not go and sign with the immigration officer, so I’m going to remand you in fooken custard-y.” So, I had to go down to Winson Green Prison.’

  At his trial the judge had rejected Adam’s claim that the drugs had been for his personal use, and had handed him a three-year sentence.

  ‘I went straight to Shrewsbury Prison, which was full of white boys from Stoke City. I loved those guys. They called me Captain ’cos of the tattoo on my hand. To be honest with you, all the time I was in England I got on with white guys more than black guys. If you say you’re from Africa the black British treat you differently, they diss you. The white guys don’t care.’

  While Adam was awaiting trial, Rochelle had visited him twice a week, and she had kept these visits up when he had been moved to HM Prison Shrewsbury. One morning, he’d broken down and told her how sorry he was that she would give birth to their child while he was locked up. Her response had taken him by surprise.

  ‘She said, “Don’t worry, my daddy was locked up when my mum had me. My mum and me was fine. Your baby will be fine and so will I.”’

  When Rochelle was eight and a half months pregnant, Adam had been moved to HM Prison Stafford. In the early hours of 9 December 2007, he had been roused by one of the wardens.

  ‘He said, “Adam, are you expecting a baby?” I said, “Yeah.” He said, “Congratulations, you’re a father.”’

  Adam had celebrated by drinking prison hooch with his Pakistani cellmate. He had met Aniya for the first time a week later, in the visitor’s centre. Eighteen months into his sentence he had been informed that his release was imminent, but that he would be taken directly to Heathrow Airport and put on a plane back to Africa. The news had come as a great shock to Rochelle, but Adam had not been surprised.

  ‘For six years I never thought about Tanzania but in prison I started dreaming about Dar es Salaam every night. I would see my uncles and aunts praying in a circle for me to come home. I have a difficult family, to be honest. If you get somewhere in life they want to pull you back. It was them who gave me those dreams, I swear, and I knew that no matter what I was going to try with the British government, my family would pull me home.’

  This was not the first time that Adam had characterised his family as a kind of negative force, bent on keeping him from happiness. I wondered whether he hadn’t just processed his homesickness in this manner, as a way of staving off his guilt about leaving Rochelle and Aniya. I pressed for clarity.

  ‘Did you dream that your family members were worried about you, and praying that you would return safely?’

  ‘No, not worried about me – worried that I might be doing something good with my life. They do not want me to go forward. It would drive them mad and they would not sleep until I came back down. You can’t understand my family until you come to Tanzania with me and meet them.’

  I left it there, remembering that he was, once again, in a cell, three years and half a world away from his daughter.

  The last time he had seen Aniya was in Harmondsworth Immigration Removal Centre, near Heathrow. Adam had called a former girlfriend called Nanette and begged her to bring Rochelle and Aniya across the country for one last visit. Rochelle had packed Adam’s possessions into a single backpack.

  ‘I gave her a hug when she arrived and said, “I’m going, nothing I can do.” I picked Aniya up and hugged her, then let her play on the floor for two minutes while I talked to her mother. Rochelle was crying. I told her, “Don’t worry about me, just look after the baby, do everything you can.”’

  Adam had called Rochelle hours after he landed in Dar es Salaam.

  ‘She said, “Are you already there?” I said, “I’m here, I don’t know what to do.”’

  In fact, Adam had known exactly what he was going to do. He had caught a bus to Mbagala Road in the township of Temeke, where he had spent his teenage years. Here, he had scouted the street scene and found a vacant plot bordered by derelict buildings – an ideal spot for developing his own maskani. To ensure that his maskani was instantly and permanently busy, he had cooked breakfast, lunch and dinner, and shared his meals with anyone who stopped by. Before long, he’d commanded a network of confederates, mostly men in their late teens – the age Adam had been when he had left Tanzania. They had found his stories of ships and British cities intoxicating, and had been awed by his golden teeth and his nautical tattoos. The area’s residents had been appalled, but, since Adam had issued strict instructions that no crime be committed in the immediate neighbourhood, there had been little that anybody could do about the increasingly busy maskani.

  That had changed one evening after a football derby. The local team had lost, and a player from the winning side had come to Adam’s maskani to gloat. He had worked the younger men into a frenzy of indignation by the time Adam had intervened.

  ‘I told the guys, “Forget about it, that’s football, sometimes you win and sometimes you lose.” It’s like the white people say, sometimes tea, sometimes coffee. This guy stood up out of nowhere and said, “Msenge, what does msenge know about football?” Msenge means “gay” in Swahili, that’s what he called me. I just stood and put him three times in the chest with my screwdriver, bup bup bup. He screamed, “Aah, you’re killing me, please, please.” One of my friends said, “Yow, you need to go, Memory,” so I left but I didn’t like to run away because of this boy, so I came back and the police were waiting for me. They hit me with a big stick – bang, on my head – and took me to Chang’ombe police station. I thought, If this guy dies I’m going down, so I was preparing myself to go to Keko Prison by robbing the new people coming into the police cells. Anyone in Dar es Salaam will tell you that you can’t go to Keko with nothing and expect to survive. You need something to trade. On the third day in Chang’ombe, the older brother of the guy I stabbed came to talk to me. He was an old Beachboy, and we talked nicely for an hour. Afterwards he said, “I see you have no problem, you’re a peaceful guy, maybe my brother has the problem.” He told the police his family was dropping the case.’

  In a gush of relief, Adam had divided all of his money between the inmates, and had even stepped out of his clothes and handed them to the men he had robbed.

  ‘When I left by the back entrance I was wearing only my boxers, and the policemen who were playing cards there stood up and ran, shouting, “Chizi ana kimbiya, a madman has
escaped.” I walked straight to the house of the guy I stabbed, and he also started shouting, “Memory, I’m sorry, I’m sorry, don’t kill me.” I told him, “Please, settle down, I’m here to apologise. I lost my temper and I stabbed you. You’re lucky you lived, but I’m also lucky because if you died my life would be over as well, so let us give thanks to Allah.” He prayed with me and even gave me some clothes to wear, but the residents around my maskani now believed I was a monster. I knew that they would keep calling the police until I was in prison, so I decided to come back to South Africa.’

  Adam had set forth without money or emergency travel documents, planning to hitch or hide away in trucks.

  ‘Beachboys call this chukua safari ki, to stow away on land,’ he said.

  He had made it through Malawi and reached Inchope in central Mozambique before he had been arrested for having no papers. It was 13 March 2010. He had spent the next three months in Beira Prison, where he had attained a measure of local fame by claiming that he was a Jamaican citizen who had been robbed while on his way from Johannesburg to Nairobi, where, he claimed, he was due to meet his girlfriend.

  ‘Some newspaper people came and interviewed me, and after the story was published the police sent a real Rasta woman from Jamaica to suss me out. That was in early June and she told me she was going back to Jamaica in July. I said, “I wish me was you mum, going home. Miya suffer here you know, sista, no food to nyam.” The police asked her, “Is he really Jamaican?” and she said, “He sound Jamaican. I think he Jamaican.” The next day they let me out and gave me emergency travel documents and a ticket to Maputo, pocket money as well. I arrived around 9 p.m. in the centre of Maputo.’

  The first person Adam had spoken with was an old man, who wore big yellow-framed glasses like a clown.

  ‘“Where you from?” he asked. I showed him my emergency travel documents and he said, “You from Jamaica? You’re welcome. No jaja no muse.” Tha’s what Bob Marley told the people – no weed, no music. He took me to an old house to sleep. I woke up in the morning and I saw there was a shit next to my head. In Swahili we call a place like this a gofu house: no windows, no water, no electricity, pure ghetto. In Maputo so many people live in gofu houses.’