Anna Matsushita

  “Look, Mummy, a Chinaman!” “And a child.” “I didn’t know that a Chinaman has a child.” “I’m going to write an essay about it.” These words were spoken by a young white girl about my father. It was the most overtly racist remark I had encountered at that point in my life. Our family had moved to the outskirts of London from Japan, due to my father’s work transfer. It was the late 1980s, and I must have been around 16 years old. One day, while waiting with my father at a tube station, a white British mother and her daughter were nearby. Suddenly, the young girl began calling my father a "Chinaman." Her mother looked on with pride, as if her daughter had made some insightful observation, beaming at her with a face full of approval. I immediately approached the mother. “My father isn’t Chinese,” I said. “And it’s perfectly normal for any human being to have children. If your daughter can make such blatantly racist remarks, it’s your duty as her parent to correct her. Instead, y...

  One day, about 40 years ago, I was on the way from school to the underground station .   At that time, few people started call Japanese “Slanted eyes” at the school.  The person making racial remark was using typical London way - to wisper into your ear a racist remark, to make sure you hear it but no one else.  It was almost everyday thing that adults in suites wisper into my ear with horrible racist remarks. Beware, it was almost 40 years ago and things might be different now. Few girls, who have faced racial abuse for the first time, were either in deep shock or panic.  As I consoled them and give them emotional support, I was beginning to think I can not take this burden any more. Everyday, someone was crying, and they somehow call me and asked me to listen to  what they have to say.   One of the girls reported the racial remarks to a teacher who was responsible for the school affairs.   The process was slow, and I was almost t...