Then, maybe ten paces behind her: also gripping an open can, he’s got this pained look in his eye, an angry pain, like someone offered him a lump of sugar and instead poured salt on his tongue. I knew it was him who had hit her. He was staring straight ahead, following in her tracks. She might be his girlfriend. Not seen them together before. He sleeps in doorways in the cold, in piss-stained trousers and an old puffer jacket. No blanket. You often find him unconscious and frozen under an advertising board. Paramedics come and take him away in an ambulance. Next morning he’s stretched out on the bench at the tram stop, empty bottle of vodka tipped on its side underneath him. Each time I see him, I think: How is that poor fucker still alive? Been living this life for the decade I’ve been here and no doubt many years before. He might be thirty. But he looks fifty. Face all cracked and scabby. Soulless eyes. What does that even mean? Just the eyes of a man who was once a baby and has never known compassion. Still, that doesn’t give you the right to go around punching women.

When I saw him I felt anger. I wanted to shout at him: Was that you that did that to her? Show me your knuckles! When I see that they’re reddened, give him an openhand slap and shout at him: Don’t hit women!

But what good would come of it? Who the fuck am I?

Here’s the video, filmed by my wife (for which I’m very grateful!) The official Ted one will be available soon I guess. You’ll have to make do with the bootleg version for now. If you’re even interested, that is.

A big thank you to the organisers for inviting me to speak. And for pushing me out of my comfort zone and offering me this new experience.

Mind the gap.

Mum flipped burgers at McDonalds. It was hot work, sweating over the grills, but with no time to pause and think, time passed quickly. Time did not pass quickly for me. From the moment Mum stepped out of the flat until the moment she reappeared at the end of our street many hours later, dressed in her brown McDonald’s uniform and carrying the cheeseburger she’d brought back for my dinner, I’d stand on a chair, my face pasted to the window by a sticky concoction of tears and snot, crying as though my whole family had been slaughtered before my eyes. Babysitters would leave traumatised.

Soon I had been blacklisted by every babysitter in South-East London. Nan stepped in and the crying stopped. She’d bring colouring books where, instead of colouring in with pens, you dipped a paintbrush in an eggcup filled with water and then stroked the wet brush over the page, and like magic the water turned into paint and coloured the picture. She also brought packets of Wotsits to stuff into my mouth. I loved Wotsits. My fingers would turn orange and I’d suck the cheesy residue from them with undisguised joy. In the afternoon Nan would tie her headscarf into a knot under her chin and we’d go to the park to feed the ducks.

Nan was the glue that held the family together. Old school South London matriarch. She and Grandad lived in the same tower block in Denmark Hill that they’d moved into after getting married just after the war. The same flat Dad and his three siblings had grown up in, topping and tailing, kitted out in ill-fitting hand-me-downs and scrapping with the other kids of the estate on the grass bank outside. The same flat Mum had moved into as a teenager after Nanny Brenda had killed herself—and the same flat she and Dad had returned to years later, Mum carrying me in her belly, while they saved up the deposit for the flat above Rose.

We’d ride the train there for Sunday dinner. The flat was stuffy: a constant haze of cigarette smoke and steam emanating from the numerous pots of boiling vegetables: broccoli and cauliflower, soft as mush. Nan and Grandad each smoked a pack a day and had done since the war. The smoke made my eyes burn and my throat scratch. Grandad never moved from his armchair in the corner of the room: fag in one hand, cup of tea on the side, struggling to see the telly through his thick-rimmed glasses because the lenses had steamed up like the inside of a car windscreen on a winter morning. Horseracing or snooker on the telly, volume turned up as far as it would go. Is someone whistling?

GRANDAD! YOUR HEARING AID!

Grandad grins, fiddles with the gadget in his ear and the whistling stops. Strong but silent: the only time Grandad expressed himself was when any of his four sons were at each other’s throats—then he’d fly out of his chair while emitting this booming “OIIII!” grab the two sons by their heads, one in each hand; tell them and everyone else on the estate: “I BLOODY WARNED YOU!” and crack their heads together like a couple of coconuts.

Nan and Grandad fell in love as teenagers during the war. Then the army shipped him off to Palestine. He wrote her love letters, which she kept in a little wooden box. Grandad never spoke a word about his time in the war, except to complain: “Bloody post’s always late in Palestine!”

At every family gathering, one of the brothers would turn to Grandad and say: “Dad, ave you told em about Palestine?”

Grandad would remain silent, struggling to suppress a smirk, eyes fixed on the telly. Carry on puffing on his fag, but there’d be a sparkle in his eye. Then everyone would deliver the punchline at the same time: “BLOODY POST’S ALWAYS LATE IN PALESTINE!” and burst out laughing. Grandad wouldn’t take his eyes off the screen, but on his face would be an open-mouthed grin, his few remaining yellow teeth on full display.

The only story Nan ever told about the war (and she told it over and over again) was this one: As a teenager, to protect her from German bombs, she had been evacuated from London to the Kent countryside. One spring lunchtime, walking alone on a country lane, the bright sun reflecting off the buttercups of the surrounding fields, birds singing, crickets chirping, leaves blowing gently in the subtle breeze and only a small handful of fluffy white clouds floating in the blue sky, she bent down to smell a dandelion and heard a rumble overhead.

Looking up, she saw a solitary German fighter plane, exiting a marshmallow cloud, heading for the coast and back to base in Northern France. The pilot saw my nan, too, and when he did, he turned the plane and started flying it towards her. Realising she was about to be attacked, Nan started to run for her life. She knew she had to get off the road, as the pilot had lined the plane up with it just as he would a runway; but the only place to go was into a thorny bush of brambles, and to get there she’d have to dive over a low wall. The teenage girl was in two minds—surely she was being silly. But then, still running, she turns her head to look up at the sky behind her and there he is, all lined up: no doubt about it she is being divebombed! She threw herself headfirst over the brick wall and landed painfully in the bush; her arms, legs and face scratched to pieces; her whole body tingling: she’d landed in stinging nettles. The pilot sprayed the road with bullets before picking up altitude and heading home.

After being chased down a country lane and shot at by a plane, the poor girl was a bag of nerves. Still shaking two weeks later. Couldn’t hold a cup of tea without spilling it. She went to the doctor, told him what had happened, asked if there wasn’t something he could give her to calm her nerves. The doctor pulled open his desk drawer, took out an almost full pack of cigarettes, handed them to her and said, “Give these a try.”

Thanks for reading. This is a reworking of a piece I posted about four years ago at the beginning of my Substack days. Some of you old heads might remember it.

—

I STEPPED OUT of Warsaw station into the icy night air, just as the clock on the tower opposite struck 11. I blew on my fingers and saw my breath. Today had brought the first snow of winter but it hadn’t fully settled on the ground. I navigated my way through the scattered huddles of drunk homeless folk, rowdy and aggressive, that prowled the area directly in front of the station. I followed the directions on the piece of paper and, with the help of a few taxi drivers, found the bar where I’d arranged to meet my Couchsurfing host: an Englishman called Jon, and his group of mates.

The table space in front of me quickly filled up with pints of beer and shots of Polish Vodka—everyone felt like buying me a drink. I downed everything in front of me and was told that we were heading to a club. I’d only eaten some crackers and a can of mackerel all day, I felt weak and exhausted, but I couldn’t bring myself to dampen my new friends’ spirits so I asked what I should do with my luggage. They spoke to the barman. His name was Max and he said that I could keep my stuff in the downstairs cellar and pick it up the following morning. Apprehensive as I was about leaving all of my possessions with a stranger in a pub, I didn’t feel like I had much say in the matter.

I went out with my new friends. It was an interesting experience. The club was a mosh-pit packed with bear-sized men with skinheads and women with mohawks. There was no cloakroom—you chucked your coat over wooden beams on the ceiling. A fight broke out between some neanderthals. We left after the music stopped.

I woke at 2 the following afternoon. I wanted to shower and brush my teeth but couldn’t, as my belongings were still in the cellar of a pub I had no idea how to reach. A hungover Jon jotted down vague directions on a scrap of paper.

An hour of walking later I was lost in the city centre, going around in circles. People rushed past me in all directions as the snow fell relentlessly. The streets were rammed with people celebrating Polish Independence Day. Young men dressed in WWII military uniforms paraded up and down the main street; old tanks and cannons lined the side of the road; and all around people drank vodka and toasted national heroes. I began looking around for a taxi driver to point me in the right direction when I felt a tap on my shoulder. I span around to see Max standing there smiling broadly. He laughed when I told him I was searching for the bar. He said we were nowhere near, but he was on his way there now and I could walk with him.

We walked and talked and the subject of why I was in Poland came up. Max loved the story and as soon as we got into the bar he instructed the girl behind the counter to make me a cup of tea. After I had warmed myself, Max said that he would like to invite me to eat with him in a Chinese restaurant just around the corner. After barely eating for the past few days, my hunger had been replaced by a numb feeling all over my body. The offer was too kind to refuse. We walked to the small restaurant and sat down at a table. Max ordered two starters, two cans of drink and a large plate of fried chicken with noodles for my main course and then began to tell me his story. Originally from Sierra Leone, he had been forced to flee the war-torn country and build a new life for himself in Europe. He had endured so much hardship and pain but he explained to me his simple philosophy for life as follows: “If you are a good person and have a good heart, you will get what you deserve. If not in this life, then in the next.”

Then he gave me a concrete example.

“When I was a young boy in school, I was always kind to everyone in my class. I was popular because I was a good kid. One night years later, when the war was happening in my country, a group of rebel soldiers came and took me away. They beat me badly before holding a gun to my head. They were going to kill me. Then the leader of the group turned up. He looked at me and asked, “Max. Is that you?” Through my badly beaten eyes I looked at him but couldn’t recognise the face. “Max. It is you. I went to school with you. Remember me? How are you?” The leader then ordered his men to let go of me before saying, “You were so good to me in school. When I had problems with my studies you were always the one to help me. I am so sorry for what my boys have done to you today. Listen, Max, for your own safety you have to get out of Freetown. I can give you a pass to get through. If anyone stops you, you just tell them to call me. But you have to go. It is the only way I can save your life after you helped me so much in school.” And that was when I escaped my country and came to Europe.”

For the umpteenth time on this journey, I was rendered speechless. Sat in front of me was someone so positive about life, so optimistic, who worked so hard for so little money, but who had seen the worst side of mankind. How did he remain so upbeat?

“If you have a good heart, you will see the good in people and in life,” he said.

The food was brought over, I looked down at it, picked up a fork and realised I had no appetite. My stomach had shrunk and I couldn’t eat. I chewed on the first piece of chicken for an eternity as Max demolished his meal in no time. I was embarrassed. He had brought me here and spent money on my dinner and now I couldn’t eat it. I tried harder to force some down, but it was as if I had forgotten how to swallow. I just felt sick. I apologised and he told me not to worry and that I should take it away in a doggy bag and just try to eat little bits of it slowly throughout the evening. I did, and after a few beers back at the flat managed to get it all down just before bed.

Thanks for reading. If you missed the first story from this series, you can read it here.

BORDEAUX TRAIN STATION, six o’clock in the evening, cold and dark and pissing down outside, I’m standing in the middle of the main hall, oblivious to the rush-hour madness pushing and shoving all around me, watching (for no particular reason) a Chinese guy struggling with a ticket machine.

The Chinese guy notices he’s being watched and suddenly turns and starts walking straight at me with a determined look in his eye, like he’s about to go Jackie Chan on my staring ass! Before I have time to apologise, he asks in English if I can help him understand the French instructions the ticket machine is arrogantly dishing out.

Sure, why not, I’ll give it a go—I don’t speak French, but I can probably read it.

It turns out the ticket he wants has to be purchased in person from the ticket office, so I accompany him to the room to act as his interpreter. Again, no idea why either of us thought this was a good idea, I’ve already told you I didn’t know French; although I did know slightly more than he did. The queue was long and, as he spoke good English, we started chatting, and I told him a bit about the journey I was on—to which he replied, “Wow! This is something really funny and amazing!”

After we had secured his ticket and I was saying goodbye, he told me he wanted to cook me a Chinese meal and hear more about my trip, so I followed him to a student residence close to the station and, as we walked down the long corridor from the lift to his room, I realised mine was the only non-Chinese face in the building. The whole block, he explained, was inhabited by Chinese students.

I dropped my backpack onto the floor in the corner of his room and we introduced ourselves properly. Baijian was 24 years old and was completing his post-graduate studies in France. There was an open-door policy in force on his floor and every few minutes a different Chinese student stuck his head in to say hello to my host; and each time Baijian explained to the person in Chinese the story of how this English guy had ended up in their building, and then switched to English to introduce me. Everyone expressed their awe at what I was doing, the words ‘brave’ and ‘crazy’ were thrown around liberally—I had taken on instant hero status among the Chinese, and I gotta tell you, it felt pretty damn good.

As Baijian started to cook dinner, I was invited into the bedroom opposite to check my emails on somebody’s laptop and to watch TV. If I was thirsty, I was poured a drink. If I was tired, I was told to put my feet up on the bed. Over the next half hour, two dozen different Chinese students came to introduce themselves to me, and they sat around asking me questions, telling jokes, offering me snacks, and just being curious and funny and kind. After feeling so exhausted, hungry and dejected just an hour earlier, I couldn’t process all that had happened to change my predicament.

Dinner, despite the struggle with the chopsticks, was delicious. Desert, not so much: chopped banana and pear—covered in mayonnaise! Fortunately it was custom to eat from the same bowl, so all I had to do was pretend to eat very slowly while watching Baijian demolish the lot. Seriously though, fruit with mayonnaise—who does that? (I asked ChatGPT if I might be remembering it wrong, but nope, the Chinese really do).

As evening turned to late night, I started thinking about returning to the train station, where I would have to spend the night as there wouldn’t be any trains leaving for Paris until the morning. Baijian’s room was so tiny and cramped that I suddenly felt I was intruding on his personal space, so I stood up, thanked him for everything and headed for the door. But as I was doing so, a girl entered the room dragging a mattress behind her. While I had been in his friend’s room earlier, Baijian had paid a visit to every single student on the floor asking if anyone had any extra bedding.

“You will stay here tonight,” he told me. “You can’t sleep in the train station; it’s too cold and too dangerous. Please, you are my guest. We will wake early tomorrow and go to the station together, as I am travelling with my friends to Biarritz.”

I was lost for words. I thought I might cry.

Throughout the night Baijian was like a kid at a pyjama party: he wouldn’t stop talking. Each time I got five minutes of silence and thought he had fallen asleep, he would ask another question about my journey or my life back in England and I would answer him. I didn’t have the heart to tell him to go to sleep; he was too nice a guy. We parted company at the train station early the following morning, but not before he handed me a bag of salami sandwiches he had prepared for me while I showered.

Ever since then I’ve kept a special place in my heart for the Chinese. And in each one of the Chinese students that I’m fortunate enough to welcome into my classroom every year, I see Baijian and his friends and feel a warmth that is hard to explain.

I was three years old.

I toddled to the open door and watched from the landing: Mum stabbing the knife through Rose’s letterbox, in-out, in-out, screaming at the top of her lungs: “THIS IS THE LAST TIME, ROSE! YOU HEAR ME YOU EVIL OLD COW! I’LL KILL YOU!”

On the other side of her door, Rose was yelling into her phone: “HELLO! … POLICE! … MAD WOMAN FROM UPSTAIRS! … TRYNA KILL ME AGAIN!”

Mum screaming: “TELL EM TO BRING A BODY BAG, ROSE!”

Dad wasn’t there because he was working the night shift.

I don’t remember feeling anything as I watched Mum stabbing that knife in and out of Rose’s letterbox, threatening to kill her.

Then two policemen showed up. They escorted Mum back upstairs and into the flat. one of them patted the top of my head. They chatted over a cup of tea and left.

We lived in Eltham, South-East London, in a semi-detached house converted into small flats: two up, two down. Rose was the old lady who lived downstairs.

She had straggly grey hair, a bony nose and warts on her chin.

She would scream at us through her letterbox whenever we entered the building: accusing Mum and Dad of spying on her in the bath and plotting to kill her.

At night, she would stand under my bedroom window, her open dressing gown blowing in the wind, banging metal dustbin lids together as though they were cymbals, cackling demonically and wailing like a banshee.

I’d wake up in my cot, screaming.

Mum would come into the room, pick me up, cuddle me, rock me on her shoulder.

Don’t be afraid of that nasty old witch, she’d say, Nanny Brenda will protect you.

Nanny Brenda killed herself before I was born.

Mum wouldn’t be getting me back to sleep that night or any other night Rose was out there banging on those dustbin lids wailing like a demon.

Imagine getting a tummy ache and your boss phoning your spouse to come get you.

Imagine skipping lunch because you’re saving up your lunch money to go bowling.

Imagine having a football-themed birthday party at the local leisure centre and only inviting your favourite workmates.

Imagine coming home from work with holes in the knees of your trousers from doing skids on the polished office floor.

Imagine settling office disputes by arranging to fight in the carpark after work. Imagine everyone from the building forming a circle to watch. Imagine them all chanting FIGHT - FIGHT – FIGHT – FIGHT!

Imagine the men from the office standing in the carpark at lunchtime swapping football stickers. “Got, got, need, got, need, got…” Imagine arguing over whether shinies are worth two. Imagine your boss confiscating your stickers, locking them in her desk drawer and not giving them back till the end of the day.

Imagine sitting at your desk watching the rain beating down outside the window, knowing that if it doesn’t stop soon you won’t be allowed outside on your lunch break.

Imagine getting to work two hours before it opens, to ensure first pickings from the conker tree.1 Imagine booting a football into the branches to knock down the fresh ones. Imagine your dad looking at your conker and saying it wants dipping in vinegar and baking in the oven. Give it a fighter’s chance. Imagine your dad doing it for you.

Imagine putting on a nativity play at Christmas with your colleagues. Imagine being excused from attending meetings because you’re rehearsing. Imagine playing one of the three wise men and wearing a false beard that itches your face. Imagine spouses, children, elderly parents coming to watch you in the play. Imagine them filming it on their phones and sharing it in WhatsApp groups because they’re proud of you.

The first time I nearly cried in front of my students was yesterday morning. I was sitting at my desk in the classroom, twenty faces in front of me, (Master’s students at the business school I teach English at in France), the room silent because they were doing a written assessment as part of their midterms.

The prompt for their piece of writing was:

“Imagine receiving a letter from your future self, 20 years from now. What advice, encouragement, or insights would your future self want to share with you today?”

The students were a mix of personalities, backgrounds, ethnicities, all in their early twenties. As soon as they had completed the task, they were to bring their work to the front, leave it on my desk, and then they were free to leave; providing me a headstart on reading and marking while the more thoughtful students took their time.

The first handful of early finishers wrote mostly superficial letters explaining how rich they had become, sitting in big offices as the CEOs of large multinational companies. Pretty boring, but not surprising at a business school.

But the letters that began trickling in after the first batch were different. They were deep, honest letters, full of exposed vulnerability, fear, anxiety, pain, worry, struggle.

The common pieces of advice they were offering themselves were: Believe in yourself more. Stop procrastinating. Spend more time doing the things that make you happy. Drink less. Stop hurting yourself. When it feels like you can no longer go on, that life is too unbearable, the pressure too great and you don’t want to get out of bed, know that it does get better, you just can’t see the light yet through the dark clouds.

They wrote things like:

“You are feeling a lot of things and you don’t know how to manage them all. But you can do it, because I did it. When life is difficult, just breathe, take a seat and write down everything you are feeling. It is important to not keep it inside you.”

“I’m sure what you would like to hear right now is, Just follow your dreams! Make your dreams come true! Except we know, you and I, the reality of this world and the incompatibility of our aspirations within it.”

“You are 42 years old and for the first time in your life happy. You quit your highly-paid bullshit job to live on a farm in the mountains with your five best friends.”

“Along the way, you learn how to forgive and not hold grudges, even when people don’t apologise. You come to understand that you too have hurt people without apologising, and that everybody makes mistakes. But only by making these mistakes can we learn and grow.”

One student’s description of the debilitating physical pain they feel just from the effort of walking to school in the morning, due to a medical condition, was the straw that almost broke the camel’s back. As I read these deeply personal admissions, looking up from time to time at the students focussed on the lined paper in front of them, I felt a surge of sadness, a lump forming in my throat, my eyes becoming moist.

The day before, I had learnt of the suicide of an ex-student. one of the students whom, over the twenty years since I started teaching, I had most identified with.

Lou studied at the school of Political Science where I also teach. My wife teaches Spanish at the same school and that semester in 2019 we were both fortunate enough to have Lou in our classroom. Lou was brilliant. Exceptionally intelligent, both academically and emotionally. Warm. Quick-witted, with a dry sense of humour. Lou never made it to the 8am class on time, often an hour late, but when she eventually walked in, long leather trenchcoat, embarrassed smile and apology, you could only smile too, because you appreciated the effort she’d made to turn up at all. At the end of the class she would come and apologise again — she was having sleeping problems she said, mornings were a struggle but she would try harder. She looked you in the eye when she spoke. She was able to laugh at herself. She was authentic.

Lou was eighteen years old, but when she spoke, slowly and with purpose, no hint of a foreign accent despite English not being her native tongue, you felt you were talking to a wise, cynical adult in the queue at the post office, an old soul who understood humanity and the world on a deep level. Only her young, innocent face reminded you she was still a kid, away from home and family for the first time, just starting out on “the journey.” Lou was an artist. Bohemian vibes. Uninterested in the superficial. Her own person. She wasted no words. She would sit silently during class discussions, looking bored, sipping her coffee, fiddling with a stick of cigarette filters. Then suddenly she’d respond to something said, make an observation no one else’s mind had considered, mine included. The rest of the class would listen in silent admiration.

My wife and I would share over dinner the nuggets of wisdom Lou had imparted in our classes that morning — she was no less perfect in Spanish than English — and laugh affectionately at her effortless genius, her likeable nature. We would despair over how easy it all seemed for her, compared to other students who worked their arses off without reaching Lou’s level. If only she could appreciate how far she has the potential to go in this world … if only she would just make an effort!

In Lou’s evaluation that semester I wrote:

“Missed written assessment through absence. Exceptional in the oral presentation and also in the debate (even if lazy in both with regards preparation).”

When I discovered the news, I was looking up ex-students on LinkedIn, seeing how they were doing. As a general rule, students of this particular school go on to reach excellence in whatever field they decide to dedicate themselves. I wondered if Lou had picked her feet up and achieved what she was supposed to. Usually the gifted students who lack effort in the first year come back for the second reinvigorated by the wake-up call of low grades. Surely Lou would be another example.

I looked through my old class lists on the school’s online platform to remind myself of her surname. I found Lou’s name, and next to it my eyes fell on the word: “decedée.”

Instant nausea hit the pit of my stomach. I had to be misunderstanding the word. Lou couldn’t be deceased. Please! It even crossed my mind for a moment that she had changed her name as a joke.

A Google search confirmed my fears. Lou’s death had made the news. Suicide. By such a definitive method that left no chance of failure. Nor could it be put down to “a cry for help gone wrong.” My whole body went numb. I thought I might vomit.

I messaged my wife: “Remember Lou?”

“Of course!” my wife replied with a smiling emoji. “Why? What’s she done?”

Lou was twenty years old when she died in 2021. Correction: Lou was twenty years young. Today she would still only be twenty-two.

The hopelessness Lou must have felt. The loneliness. Despair. I know, because at Lou’s age I felt it too. I need all my fingers and all my toes to count the times I felt suicidal throughout my early twenties. I spent periods under the care of mental health professionals. Hospitalised. Locked in a police cell once when I was deemed too much of a danger to myself. The only thing I wanted throughout those periods was for it all to end — I knew things could never get better. And that no one could understand.

But they did get better. They always get better. And now I’m forty years old. Married to a kind and beautiful woman. I’ve travelled the world. Lived in many countries. Learnt languages. Loved. Been loved. Had my heart broken. Had my broken heart mended. Time and again. These days, not a day passes in which my students don’t teach me something new, while at the same time I’m able to pass on some of my life experience to them. Whether they are able to take it in is another matter — I couldn’t always at that age.

If I had succeeded in taking my own life as a young man (still a kid, now that I look back), I would have achieved none of these things that I deemed impossible. I wouldn’t have made it to middle age, finally been diagnosed with ADHD, started to understand myself. I would be remembered as a tragedy. And as I write these words, I feel sick, because I survived and Lou didn’t. It’s not fair. Lou won’t pass on her experience to future generations, and that is humanity’s loss. Life’s not fair.

I grew up on a council estate in England. No stranger to suicide. My father was fifty-three when he took his own life. He wasn’t the only man to leave via the tracks of our local train station, there were many. When the policeman confirmed that it was my dad’s body they were picking up in bits from the tracks, I didn’t cry, I threw some chairs, smashed a table up, drank a bottle of Jack Daniels, fought the bouncer of a local bar. My maternal grandmother took her own life (before I was born) at the age of thirty-eight. Both of these suicides I have been able to rationalise to some extent. But neither my wife nor I will ever be able to accept Lou’s passing. It will never not hurt. I can only imagine the grief experienced by Lou’s family and loved ones1. My sympathy for them is enormous.

The second time I nearly cried in front of my students came at the end of the evening. On the same campus Lou’s presence had graced at the school of Political Science. As the students entered the room, I asked them how they were doing. “Stressed,” they said, heads on tables and in hands. The pressure they’re under is immense, even without the added weight that comes with the midterms.

At the end of the lesson I spoke from the heart. Told them I hoped they were all coping. That there are people they can talk to if they’re not. Told them there’d been a student for whom this advice was too late. My eyes filled with water. They understood. I asked them to look after each other, then I let them go.

I stood alone in the empty classroom for a few minutes. Composed myself. Went to the bathroom, looked in the mirror, my eyes were red. I walked home, barely keeping it together. My wife was waiting for me. When I walked in the door, she hugged me and it all came bursting out. The tears flowed from both of us. We cried for Lou.

It took Lou’s tragic story to get me to talk openly about these things. And to cry. But why? (I’ve told you my wife’s assertion). Our mental health is not something we should be ashamed of. We all go through dark patches. Students and young people in particular, no matter what type of school, all experience it. Every one of us old(er) people knows how it feels, we haven’t always been old, you know?

If you are reading this and you’re struggling yourself, please, talk to someone. You can’t see it right now, but there are better days ahead. And there are people who care about you. Keep an eye on your friends and family. Are they doing OK? Check on them.

R.I.P. Lou. You will forever be remembered.

Angie Boyd’s Mum is there, wearing a short leather skirt, squatting in the corner. She stands up quickly, revealing a steaming puddle between her stilettos. Her red leather jacket is open, barely concealing two plastic spheres contained in a string vest. Kids at school call Angie Boyd’s Mum Cher.

“Ain’t you boys got no manners?” she squawks. “Clear off! I’m meeting a friend!”

The boys rest the mattress on their feet, but they don’t move. Angie Boyd’s Mum doesn’t budge either, just stares back at them from her heavily painted face.

Finally she says, “Ain’t you boys a bit young to be working? How old are you, fifteen?”

“Thirteen,” Dean says.

Angie Boyd’s Mum shrieks.

“What! Him too? Lurch!”

“Actually,” Dean says, “he’s twelve.”

“And three quarters!” Wesley stops sucking his thumb to interject.

“If you say so,” Angie Boyd’s Mum whispers. Then looking up to meet Wesley’s gaze, she says, “Bet you get asked all the time what the weather’s like up there, don’tcha?”

“Not by adults,” Wesley says, rolling his eyes.

“Hang on,” Angie Boyd’s Mum says, narrowing her eyes. “I know you boys. You’re in my Angie’s class. You’re Daniel Winston, I’m friends with your Uncle Bill.”

“He’s not my uncle,” Dean says. “And my name’s not—”

“He’s a fine man is what he is!” Angie Boyd’s Mum interrupts. “When’s he down next?”

Dean shrugs his shoulders.

“Missus Boyd,” Wesley says. “Get out of here will yer. We’ve got a job to do.”

“Sod off!” Angie Boyd’s Mum snaps. “Who’d’yer think yer talking to, yer cheeky git!”

Wesley sucks harder on his thumb. Sweat patches appear on his shirt.

“Please, Missus Boyd,” Dean says. “You’re giving Wesley one of his panic attacks.”

Angie Boyd’s Mum screams with amusement, composes herself and says, “Giz a fag.”

“We don’t smoke,” Dean says. “We’re kids.”

Angie Boyd’s Mum snorts.

“Yea right! Angie smokes like a Greek! I’m bloody gasping for one! How much money you got on yer?”

“We’re not gonna buy you cigarettes, Missus Boyd,” Dean says.

Angie Boyd’s Mum’s eyes look like whirlpools about to overflow. Dean feels himself being pulled into them. In Angie Boyd’s Mum’s eyes Dean sees a little girl, he sees Angie, the Angie he’s known since playschool, dressed up in adult’s clothes and thrown to the lions. He sees little Angie sitting on the kerb outside her house, crying silently into her hands, while Angie’s stepdad Phil fights with the five policemen attempting to bundle him into the van and paramedics wheel Angie’s unconscious mother out the front door and into the ambulance.

“I’ll let you see it for a fiver,” Angie Boyd’s Mum mumbles.

Dean and Wesley look at each other.

“See what?” Dean says.

“Forget it!” Angie Boyd’s Mum says. “If you’re gonna act like children!”

“We haven’t got a fiver,” Dean says. “I haven’t even got a quid for lunch.”

“Fat lot of good you are!” Angie Boyd’s Mum sneers.

“I’ve got it,” Wesley says.

Angie Boyd’s Mum looks at Wesley. She cracks a smile then wipes it from her face.  

“If you’re gonna take the piss,” she says, “you can forget it!”

Wesley pulls from his pocket a scrunched up ten-pound note and carefully unfolds it.

“I’ll need the change,” he says.

 “Ha! Good one!” Angie Boyd’s Mum says in sarcastic tone. “What change, the buttons off this jacket?”

“You said a fiver,” Wesley says. “This is ten.”

“Actually,” Angie Boyd’s Mum says, “ten’s good for the pair’a’yer to have a look.”

Wesley says he’s not interested in seeing anything Angie Boyd’s Mum has to show. But Dean does want to see it. They agree that Dean will have a look, then accompany Angie Boyd’s Mum to the shop for cigarettes and she’ll give him a fiver from the change.

The boys lean the mattress against a garage door. Dean approaches Angie Boyd’s Mum, while Wesley turns and faces the other way. Angie Boyd’s Mum puts a foot on the wall, edges up her skirt and pulls her red knickers to the side, revealing a patch of curly black hair.

“Touch it!” she orders.

Dean runs his fingertips over the fuzz, cautiously, as though petting a stray dog. It feels like Uncle Bill’s beard. Angie Boyd’s Mum grabs Dean’s wrist.

“Not there! Lower!” she growls.

She guides Dean’s hand into her, as though prodding a bee’s nest for honey, her eyes looking emptily at the clouds. Her breathing is irregular, like after a tantrum, Dean thinks.

Each time he gently pulls back his hand, Angie Boyd’s Mum squeezes tighter on his wrist, pushing into his pulse with her thumb. Dean stops resisting and pictures all the times he saw this woman staggering drunkenly along his street when he was little, slurring abuse at the kids, him included, that mocked and insulted her. The times Phil came round the house, slapped her black and blue and kicked her out onto the street in her dressing gown. More than once, from his bedroom window, Dean saw her being dragged across the grass by her hair.

It feels strange being inside another person’s body. Like he and Angie Boyd’s Mum are one. It’s warm inside a person. Wet. His wrist aches. He wonders what Angie Boyd’s Mum is thinking. Probably about taking a deep drag on that first cigarette. Or maybe she feels love. Who knows what a person thinks about when another person is inside their body.

Dean hears the whispers that follow Angie down the school corridors. Your mum’s this and soon enough you’ll be that. He thinks about how when they get to the shop, while Angie Boyd’s Mum is paying for her cigarettes, he’ll steal a bar of chocolate and give it to her.

“WHAT THE—” A man’s voice breaks the mood.

Wesley escapes over a wall. Dean too is over a different wall before the man has finished his sentence. Radio chatter crackles in the background; the man is PC Parker. Dean listens with his ear to the wall.

“Oh Julie,” PC Parker says, letting out a heavy sigh. “You can’t be doing that! That kid didn’t look older than your Angie. It’s not right, you know that. If word gets about, parents will come for you. Then they’ll come for me for turning a blind eye.”

Silence.

“Well?” PC Parker says. “Have you nothing to say for yourself?”

“Giz a fag, Tony,” Angie Boyd’s Mum says quietly.

There is the flick of a lighter. Then another. Two people inhaling deeply. Blowing out slowly through their noses. Dean feels the ten-pound note still in the palm of his hand. He’ll have to go to school after all. Find Angie Boyd. Return the money to its rightful owner.

Whatever Wesley has planned with the mattress will have to wait.

It’s quiet by Indian standards. A village elder, the only man for miles around who knows any English, his voice calming, like all native Malayalam speakers when speaking English, communicates over the gentle background noise of the crows craw-crawing as they hover overhead, the occasional purr of a moped, and the Roadrunner-like meep-meeping of horns sounded to clear the path of pedestrians.

It’s July 2017. The village is called Thodannur. The atmosphere is sticky and moist - it’s monsoon season (the downpour comes with evening, regular as clockwork, falls all night and sleeps all day). The shops that line the road are wooden shacks, their fronts pulled up. Men walk slowly in the warm air, minding their own business, dressed in the dhoti, a thin white cotton wrap-around sarong, pulled up to the knees, that allows air to flow breezily around their balls.

The man stands at the side of the tuk-tuk, leaning in slightly, and listens patiently to my explanation for being there. He is wearing a short-sleeved shirt with a pen clipped inside his breast pocket. His eyes are those of a compassionate grandfather. He emanates gentle authority, conveyed by the tidy, thick moustache and well-groomed short black hair, brushed to the side, the bald spot on the crown hardly noticeable.

He squints at the hand-written scraps of paper I wave under his nose. Studies my rudimentary drawing of a collection of stick people. Glances at the black and white photo of the man and woman from a different time. Translates to the tuk-tuk driver. Shakes his head apologetically. Furrows his brow in sympathy, while through the windscreen the locals cast glances at us over their shoulders, curious about the two white faces the tuk-tuk has brought to the village. If I had notified the village in advance, he says, they would have been able to ask around.

I step out of my body for a moment, and, completely detached from the scene, ask myself the familiar question:

How the fuck did I end up in this situation?

To answer that we have to go back four years to a cold autumn night in 2013.

I HAD RECENTLY TURNED THIRTY and the expected existential crisis had failed to show up. Sitting alone on the settee in my little council flat, spliff in hand, I watched an episode of Who Do You Think You Are, in which Meera Syal1, who was born and grew up in Wolverhampton, travelled to India to trace her roots, meet distant relatives, and discover some of the events that had led to her creation. The episode ended with Meera sitting on the family settee back in Wolverhampton, giving her parents a brick from the house where their family ancestors had once lived in the Punjab. Meera’s story had a profound effect on me.

I finished my spliff, rolled another one, smoked it, went to sleep. Got transported to India. A coastal village with a deserted sandy beach and a beautiful turquoise sea. A man was introducing me to people and everyone was happy. Tables of food lined the main path through the village; dishes exuding mouthwatering aromas, as people offered me heaped spoons of biryani and fish curry. Enveloped inside a feeling of total tranquillity, one of being at home, I didn't want to leave. The dream ended on the beach, as I walked along the shoreline, feet in the water.

Two nights later my consciousness took me back there and I awoke in no doubt as to what it meant: I was being called to India.

GROWING UP, placed among the usual collection of family snapshots on the living room wall, was this black and white photo of my great grandfather as a young man, wearing a turban, taken on his wedding day. I knew very little about the man in the picture. Only that he had come to England from India (to perform traditional Indian dance in London) and married an English woman. My mum had vague memories of sitting on his knee in their London kitchen, but he had left and returned to India to live out his final years when she was still just three years old.

I knew I was named after his son, my Grandad Kris (Krissy to those who love him), whose real name was Ram Krishnan. And that Grandad had brothers with equally Indian names, like Raja, Rama and Ranji. I knew my mum’s maiden name2 was Indian. But to me, Grandad Krissy, with his strong London accent, who we saw once maybe twice a year, was as English as a bowl of jellied eels. And as I wasn’t interested in anything that would make me different in the eyes of school bullies, (there were enough sons of restaurant owners at school for me to know the kinds of slurs it would open me up to), I just left it at that and carried on with my life.

THE QUEUE OF INDIANS lined up in front of the small window seems infinite, as we join the huddle and move slowly with it towards the ultimate goal of purchasing tickets for the train before it leaves without us. Human noise deafens the ears. There is only one train a day, we should have arrived at the station earlier.

Tickets in hand, we run to the platform and jump on as the wheels have already started to roll. On the advice of locals, we’ve bought tickets for the air-conditioned carriage. The train must date back to colonial times. The air conditioning is provided by a collection of ancient fans stuck to the ceiling. The doors stay open to allow a breeze to flow through. The sound of wheels racing along tracks dominates, as a man walks up the middle of the carriage, shouting to advertise the goods that he is peddling: hair combs, toothbrushes, paperclips, wallets.

As we roll out of the city, we pass over a level crossing, as dozens of men in white dhotis wait impatiently trackside for the train to pass. Behind the barrier, dozens more sit on mopeds, as green buses, their windows without glass, move slowly in the background.

Soon the sights and sounds of the city have been replaced by jungle. White houses, more like villas, separated sparsely among the coconut trees and greenery. The train picks up speed. We whizz through unpopulated stations, too quickly to be able to read the names. Cross a river over a rusting bridge, wide and muddy, that looks like it should be home to crocodiles.

Forty minutes into the journey, the train slows gradually, eventually coming to a standstill in the town of Vadakara. We step onto the wide platform, along with women in colourful saris. The air smells like air is supposed to smell. No pollution. Crows fly low under the platform’s roof.

Outside the station there is no town, just coconut trees. A four-wheeled tuk-tuk sits on the concourse. We greet the driver and jump in.

I WAS POOR and out of work. There was no way I could travel to India. But my curiosity had been piqued. I took out books from the library. Read up on the history. Educated myself on the main religions. Listened to sitar music. Fell in love with Anoushka Shankar. Played the track Sinister Grains on repeat, smoking weed, meditating.

I joined a group on Facebook, set up by a distant relative whom I didn’t know, in which she shared what she had learnt about my great grandfather while researching the family tree. I learnt my great grandfather’s name was Eacharoth Rama. Mum and Grandad had always referred to him just as Rama. I will too, as it seems it is what he preferred.

Rama was one of those old-school immigrants who moved to a country, adapted and integrated, started a family, never spoke a word about his past life, brought his kids up in the culture of the land of their birth and then returned to his homeland at the end of it all to see out his final years. Grandad Krissy tells me his dad was rarely home, that he spent his days in the Indian social club with his mates, where he also worked.

Rama was born in the south-western state of Kerala in 1893, and grew up close to the sea. I didn’t know this when I had the dreams. Now I explored Kerala on the internet, amazed by how much the beaches resembled those my subconscious had conjured up. Rama spoke Malayalam. His caste was Nair; his occupational title (or subcaste) was Kurup.3 His profession was actor and dancer. He came to England by sea in 1926 to perform, and later the same year he married his English fiancée Gertrude, eleven years younger than him, also a stage performer, and began having children: six sons.  

In 1959, with Rama in his 60s and in failing health, he and Gertrude returned "home" to Kerala, to live out their final years together in a house by the sea. Rama died there in 1969 at the age of 76. Gertrude moved back to England and lived into old age.

Kerala is a long state, with 580km (360 miles) of coastline, (like going from the south coast of England to Scotland), so my next task was to narrow down the potential area.

THE TUK-TUK DRIVER doesn’t speak English. I tell him to take us to the town of Villiappally. First we drive through jungle, then pass through the town of Vadakara - it seems afluent: every car on the road is French; women are dressed in elegant saris - then more jungle. Once in Villiappally, the driver stops the tuk-tuk and asks to see the address I have written down. He doesn’t recognise it.

Suddenly a collection of men, their eyes large and oval-shaped, each one sporting designer stubble and a thick moustache, swarms round the tuk-tuk, sticking their faces in the window to examine with curiousity the two white faces inside. The tuk-tuk has stopped in the middle of the road and is blocking traffic, as drivers push down on their horns. I insist to all those gathered that the words written on the paper constitute a local address. The locals beg to differ. I don’t speak Malayalam, and nobody in the rapidly-growing crowd knows English. I show them the photo of Rama and Gertrude, in the vain hope it will cause a lightbulb to go on above someone’s head. It doesn’t. I suggest to our driver that we try the local post office4.

The post office is on the first floor of a white administrative building, up a winding ramp. Inside, behind a desk, women in colourful saris, with beautiful, friendly smiles, bob their heads as they tell our driver we should try calling the local postman - if anyone with my maternal family’s name lives in the area, he will surely know it.

Our tuk-tuk driver is now invested in the search and calls the number himself. But the postman offers no clue and the call is ended.

As a final throw of the dice, a male postal worker, busy working at his own desk, is summoned to the front desk to assist, as apparently he knows some English. It takes some explaining, aided by my drawing of stick people, but he soon understands — and then he drops a bombshell…

HE PERSONALLY KNOWS A MAN WITH THE NAME WE SEEK!

Reluctantly, he agrees to find the man’s number and give him a call!

After years spent dreaming of this day, I am in the home of my ancestors, a world away from everything familiar, about to speak to and meet a distant relative.

What will I say to him? Will he be able to understand me? Will he look like me?

I SOON MOVED onto other temporary fascinations and the obsession with tracing my Indian roots faded to the background5. Still, at various points over the next four years I tapped the family name along with the word Kerala into Google. For the first few years, the search only returned a couple of hits.

• A family land dispute that existed over many decades and involved fifty coconut leaves being paid to a man who bore the family name. The text mentioned no specific location in Kerala and was full of legal jargon (Indian legal jargon, no less) rendering it hard to understand.

• A news story of the sad death by car accident of three male students in the city of Kozhikode, northern Kerala; one of whom bore the family name.

Meanwhile, I moved to Spain, found work, got absorbed by life for a couple of years. Met the amazing woman who would become my wife. Moved to France for another job opportunity. Didn’t have time for a wild Indian goose chase. Occasionally I would do a late night Google search in bed, but never deep and never resulting in any revelations.

Until one night in 2017 when a few new hits were revealed.

• A police list of all the arrests on a particular day in August 2015 that included a 30-year-old man with the family name. His home was listed as Muthavana, part of a taluk6 called Thodannur. It didn't specify his crime.

• A pension claim for a lady with either a father or husband with the family name, in a village called Valayam.

• A 92-year-old man with the family name on a list of deceased people to be removed from the 2016 electoral roll in the town of Villiappally.

All three were located in the district of Kozhikode, in the north of Kerala. It now seemed safe to assume that my great grandfather Eacharoth Rama came from the Khozikode District.

During a spring afternoon walk with my now-wife, I suggested India for our annual summer adventure. She said only if we also went to Nepal to do some trekking.

How lucky I am to have found this woman!

THE MAN ON THE PHONE doesn’t speak English and has never heard of any relative living in England. It turns out the family name I’m looking for is actually this guy’s first name … not his family name!

In a few hours the return train will leave Vadakara to take us back to Kozhikode before the monsoon rains beat down their nightly assault. The tuk-tuk driver asks if he should take us back to the station. I tell him no, take us further into the jungle, take us to Thodannur! To find the man arrested by the police for who knows what!

Our driver bobs his head enthusiastically and says, “Come on!” and now we’re speeding through the coconut trees in a race against time, meep-meeping to get other tuk-tuks out of the way, and to warn the occasional walking man, always shirtless and barefoot and wrapped in the dhoti, not to step too far from the trees.

We pass through small hamlets of white houses, separated from each other by stretches of jungle. Each hamlet is either Muslim or Communist. You always know which you are in by the colour of the electricity poles (Muslim - green; Communist - red).

Passing through a Communist village we get stuck behind a large procession, marching to express anger at the latest killing of a comrade by the Government. No amount of meep-meeping will get us through any faster, and our driver is anxious not to provoke the angry mob to redirect their fury unto us, so we slow down and hope the head of the procession is not too far up ahead.

And then, finally, we reach the entrance to Thodannur!

Where the village elder, the only man for miles around who knows any English, his voice calming, like all native Malayalam speakers when speaking English, communicates over the gentle background noise of the crows craw-crawing as they hover overhead, the occasional purr of a moped, and the Roadrunner-like meep-meeping of horns sounded to clear the path of pedestrians.

See video for climax.

So, unfortunately on this occasion I didn’t find what I was looking for.

I did get to see, smell, hear, taste and most importantly feel the part of the world that would have been so familiar to my great grandfather, and for that I am grateful.

I will have to go back to Kerala one day in the future, armed with more information, and hopefully I will be sensible enough this time to do a bit more preparation first and also allocate more days to the Khozikode District! (I better let my wife be in charge of planning.)

Although, saying that, the whole India and Nepal experience (three weeks in total) was incredible. One day I’ll take the time to write about the other places we experienced. Places like Mumbai, Kochi, Nashik, Pokhara, Kathmandu, and the villages high up in the Himalaya mountains.

Until then, let me finish by thanking Meera Syal for inspiring me so much with her story. And also my wife for being so accommodating of my ADHD-induced impulsivity and lack of planning, and for being as curious about the world as I am.

THE CITY IS IN DARKNESS. All streetlights are off. Furious packs of stray dogs have colonised certain streets. There are no women anywhere, only men, often walking in pairs, arms linked, talking in secretive tones.

After a day’s hitchhiking from the mountains of neighbouring Georgia, Gyumri, in the northwest of Armenia, near to the closed border with Turkey, seems a strange place.

We are tailing a guy in his early twenties, dressed all in black, like every other Armenian we have seen, who tells us he will lead us to the address of our host.

The man doesn't speak, just keeps walking slightly ahead of us, turning around every so often to check that we are still in tow.

Eventually we enter a large, unlit block. The man knocks the door of a ground floor flat and an old lady answers. They speak in Armenian, and just like at the border we clearly pick out the word “American,” despite neither of us being American.

The old lady responds enthusiastically to the word. She knows what we want: the American who lives upstairs.

Our guide leads us up to the second floor and knocks loudly on the door. It is answered by a man who looks Portuguese.

“Luis?” I say.

“Yes. Welcome. Come in.”

We thank our guide, who says nothing, just nods and leaves.

Inside the flat, the group of ten young, slightly drunk people from various European countries, informs us that we are going out clubbing.

I have diarrhoea, brought on by the previous night’s foray into the pleasures of homemade Georgian wine. I am exhausted. I desire a bed, a toilet, and nothing else.

My request that I jump under the shower first is met with universal laughter.

“One of the wonders of this city is that we only have water for a couple of hours each morning, and then for an hour late afternoon,” Luis tells me.

I tell him I don’t mind that there’s no hot water: a cold shower will be fine.

“You don’t understand. We have no running water of any kind. You can’t even flush the toilet. You have to pour water into it from this.” He points to a bucket of water.

A sharp pain stabs at my stomach. I ask if nightclubs have running water.

“Yes. All public buildings do.”

“OK, let’s go!” I start ushering people towards the front door.

As we walk the streets in darkness, Luis and Iustina, a larger than life Romanian girl, give us a local studies lesson.

“The reason you don’t see any women or girls on the streets is that there is a curfew for females. All women must be home for 7 in the evening and they aren’t allowed out again till morning. Nor can women smoke cigarettes,” Iustina explains.

I ask, “What about young people, don’t they go on dates?”

“Dates? No way! Girls here don’t date; they marry. The norm is to marry in the teens. If you are a girl you must remain a virgin until marriage, otherwise no man will take you and you will spend the rest of your life alone, being thought of as a whore.”

The rest of our group walks ahead of us in pairs. Closest to us are two German girls, who are being trailed slowly by a white Lada. Both the driver and his friend in the passenger seat are leaning out of the windows and speaking to them. On these unlit streets it looks sinister. I ask Luis if we should intervene.

“No, it’s fine. It’s what the men here do. The girls will probably get in the car and let them drive them to the club, and then possibly let them buy them a drink,” Luis says. “Nothing bad will happen. The girls use it as a free taxi service and a source of free drinks, and for the men, they get to have some interaction with the opposite sex.”

I ask Luis if we are heading to a sausage party.

“The place is called Relax. The only club in the city. Armenian girls, because of the curfew, can’t go there, because women out late are seen as legitimate targets for assault. The local boys don’t go there either, because it has a bad reputation, and because there are no women. So the men are either from the local Russian military base, or Armenian gangsters. You can tell them apart by their clothes,” Luis says.

I ask, “Why do they go if there are no women?”

“Well, there are some women,” Iustina replies. “A few prostitutes earn their money in there. Mostly Russian, but you also get the occasional Armenian girl.”

“Don’t you and the other girls get pestered?”

“Nope. The men here have a weird code that they adhere to strictly. They want to dance with and talk to us, but they won’t do it without first being given permission by the men we are with. Tonight that will include you,” Iustina says. “The soldiers will come and try to make friends with you. They will tell you that you are their brother. Then they’ll ask to sit down. Eventually they’ll ask your permission to take one of us to the dancefloor, or just to sit with us and chat over a cigarette. They see us as your property. They’re not bad guys, though.”

A gang of Russian lads stands around the battered wooden door of the club.

Inside, one of the walls is a large floor-to-ceiling mirror. The dancefloor is empty, as the few patrons stand around the outside in small groups, chatting and smoking.

At the near end, a fat Russian DJ stands behind his CD decks, wearing a Tap-Out MMA vest, playing cheesy Russian dance music and occasionally spitting some words into his microphone, in the style of a wedding reception DJ. And at the far end is a bar.

As we are crossing the dancefloor, a tall blonde Russian Barbie doll reaches out, taps me on the elbow and smiles. I carry on to the bar, not wishing to waste her time.

A bottle of the local beer, according to the price list, costs 400 Dram. I pay with a 500 Dram note and receive no change. I tell the barman I think he owes me a hundred.

“Service charge,” he growls.

Rather than argue, I ask him where the toilet is.

“Customer toilet out of order. You can use staff toilet. Follow me.”

He leads me through a door into a dirty kitchen hidden away behind the bar, in which an old babushka sits on a wooden stool, under a flickering light bulb, silently watching me. In the corner is a tobacco-stained door with WC written on it in pen.

Inside the WC, there is no light. On a shelf above the toilet, a collection of used razors.

On my return to the dancefloor, I find the group of European volunteers, dancing in a circle, along with a cheery prostitute in a blue dress, surrounded by a group of large men, dressed in black, watching them the way a pride of lions watches antelope.

There are four subgroups in the club; none of whom interact with any of the others.

The Armenian gangsters patrol the edges of the dancefloor with Russian hookers on their arms, or sit at tables, with the girls on their laps, drinking cocktails and kissing.

The Russian gangsters, dressed in MMA vests, stand in the corner laughing among themselves. Every so often one of them grabs a microphone and sings a popular Russian song in the middle of the dancefloor, to the visible enjoyment of his mates.

The Russian conscripts want nothing to do with their criminal element compatriots and keep themselves to themselves, dancing energetically and with smiles on their faces, looking at the girls of our group but not daring to act on their desires.

The European volunteers dance all over the place with reckless abandon, seemingly oblivious to the fact that there is anyone else in the building.

Three lads in their late teens pull up chairs next to me and shake my hand, before firing a load of Russian chatter my way. I pick up the word “brat” (brother). They are not how I imagined Russian soldiers to be. They aren't brutish, but innocent and childlike. Just kids. Dressed in blue jeans and casual t-shirts, apart from one lad of Kazakh appearance dressed in full uniform, who must have come straight from training. On realising that I don’t speak Russian, they gradually disperse.

As the night wears on, small handfuls of the young Russian soldiers are thrown out by bouncers, indistinguishable from the Armenian gangsters, supposedly for being too drunk. Until eventually only three soldiers remain: the three youngest, smallest and gentlest looking of the group: a blond lad and two Kazakhs.

The Russian gangsters decide to call it a night, and leave as one.

When I return from a trip to the toilet, Adina, my travel companion, looks upset.

“You just missed the action. It was horrible. That blonde prostitute over there deliberately walked into the back of that Kazakh kid, almost knocking him over. When he turned around, the blonde shouted some abuse at him and then that big man in the brown coat started a fight with him. The bouncers pulled them apart,” she fills me in.

I look over to the dancefloor. The three Russian soldiers are dancing on their own; the man who picked the fight is pacing around menacingly behind them; while the prostitute who started it all lingers in the background looking crafty. It is obvious that it is about to kick off, but the three Russian lads are oblivious to the danger.

Then it starts. Five large Armenians are trading blows with the three young Russians, who don’t stand a chance. More Armenians pile in from outside and join their mates in the assault. The little Kazakh is on the floor, protecting his head with his hands as the Armenians kick him like a football. His mate in uniform flies in to protect him. The lad manages to get to his feet. Someone smashes a glass bottle on his head. He doesn’t go down. The bouncers watch without intervening.

The three Russians are hurt, but not too badly. All three leave on their feet, blood running from their noses. The little lad with a large lump above his eye. He is still calling the big Armenian in the brown coat outside to finish it.

On the walk back to the flat Iustina and Luis explain that the fight was probably race-motivated. The bouncers, in cooperation with the gangsters, throughout the course of the night slowly isolated the two Kazakh-looking kids by booting out all the other soldiers. Then the prostitute did her part and lit the fuse.

“You see a lot of racism here,” Iustina says.

Before going to bed, I have one more question for Luis.

“Both the guy who led us to the flat and the lady downstairs said there were Americans living here. There are none. The two boys that we hitched the ride into the country with called us Americans. As did the border guards, despite holding our British and Romanian passports in their hands. What’s that all about?”

“You soon get used to that,” Luis replies, grinning. “Anyone here who is not Armenian or Russian is American. That’s just how it is.

And often parked overnight in the school's carpark

Because he had no petrol money.

Mr. Greenshields was everyone's favourite substitute teacher

But not because he never made a single kid do a single bit of work.

Mr. Greenshields talked to us like we were adults

But this wasn't why we all loved him either

Because he disliked adults as much, if not more so, than he disliked kids.

Mr. Greenshields knew everything about everything

The most knowledgeable man ever to walk the earth

Stephen Fry on crack

Could have been the first to win a million on Who Wants To Be A Millionaire

Without wasting a lifeline

Even though he had more friends to phone than any other contestant ever did

Or did he?

Mr. Greenshields sat at the front of the room

Pencil behind his ear

Studying the Racing Post

“Talk quietly amongst yourselves”

The man had just given us a break from maths

Or geography, or English, or history, or business studies

All subjects he could have educated us on effortlessly

Better than any of the specialised teachers ever could

Hell, he would have taught us Chinese if asked

Mandarin or Cantonese.

No one ever played up for Mr. Greenshields

Not even the bad kids.

The longer the grey hair on Mr Greenshields’ head

The thicker the grey beard

The longer the losing streak.

A haircut and a shave

A win.

An ironed shirt

The man was on a roll.

Eventually I left school

We all did

And five years later

I stood next to Mr. Greenshields

At the window in the bookies

Long grey hair

Thick grey beard

He remembered my name

Asked what I was doing with my life

“Same as you” I said

He smiled for a moment

“Teaching?” he paused … “Or - ?”

Ten years later I saw him again

He didn't need to ask

My uncut hair and thick beard

Told all there was to tell.

However, the Turkish/Armenian border is closed, making a detour through Georgia necessary.

Standing just inside Georgia, a small car carrying three men pulled over and picked us up.

NEITHER OUR DRIVER nor his two friends speak English, but they know Russian and can understand my hybrid Slavic.

“Pochemu Armeniya?” our driver asks, (Why Armenia?), his tone suggesting offence that we don't wish to see Georgia.

We lie: Friends in Armenia.

A tall man in his forties is squeezed in the back with us. In the front passenger seat sits a younger man, similar look, possibly his brother. The driver looks like ex-special forces, fifty years old, grey-haired, barrel-chested, neck thicker than my thigh, head the size of a watermelon.

He is Georgi, local boy come good. Lives in Ukraine, where he owns a bar. Back in Georgia for a few days only, catching up with old friends, two of whom, Gocha and Levan, are in the car with us.

The drive takes us high into the hills, the greyness of Vale evolving into the rolling green fields and lush countryside of the Lesser Caucasus mountains.

In the valley below, the mountains dip their feet into the river Kura. Houses are scattered far apart. Every few minutes we pass a church, all three men silently mark the cross on their chests, as peasants move along dirt paths on carts pulled by donkeys.

We arrive at a small house, its front a combination of wood and glass. Georgi takes our bags in one of his baseball glove-sized hands and carries them inside.

“Kris, Adina, coffee?”

Adina whispers: “We don't have time for this.”

I tell her it’s rude to turn down their hospitality.

The house is just one room, with a settee against the wall and a wooden table in the middle; a sink, hob and coffee pot, surrounded by a few cups in the corner; and a little walk-in storage room to the side, empty but for some tools and an unplumbed bathtub.

Levan makes coffee.

We take our cups outside and find Georgi in the adjoining field, collecting firewood. He vanishes down the path, returns a few minutes later carrying a large cooking oil container filled with homemade wine, pours each of us a glass.

He disappears again. Then he returns with a huge metal bowl filled with onions, vegetables, and the flesh of a family of pigs.

Adina goes to stand outside on her own.

Georgi puts one of his gigantic arms around me, pats me on the back. Tells me the village is called Idumala. Then he says, “Kris, yest s nami. Armeniya utrom. Spat zdes.” (Kris, eat with us. Armenia tomorrow. Sleep here.)

He goes outside to wash his hands in the stone basin.

Adina steps back inside, looking annoyed.

“OK, we've finished the coffee,” she says, “Now let's thank them, say goodbye and get back down to the main road.”

“It seems we're staying for dinner,” I say.

“What? We don't have time for this! We need to get to Armenia TODAY!”

“It seems we're sleeping here tonight,” I say.

“What makes you think that?”

“Georgi just invited us.”

Before Adina can reply, Georgi returns with a second large container of wine, pours another glass of the golden liquid for each of us, then sets about preparing the meat.

Adina sits down on the settee, resigned to her fate.

Outside the house, the men of Idumala have shown up and are working as a team to construct a makeshift grill on which the meat will be cooked on skewers. Each of the new faces comes into the house to politely introduce himself and welcome us to their village, before going back outside to crack on with the work.

Levan, who disappeared after finishing his coffee, returns with another friend, and plonks down into the sink a plastic bag full of fish so fresh they are still jumping as though being electrocuted.

The men wave away our offers of help, as the sun slowly sets behind the mountains.

The house is so tiny, I wonder where we’ll sleep. There is no indoor toilet: a hole has been dug into the mud of an adjoining field, with a small wooden box built around it.

In front of the house, the boys have got the barbecue going and are standing watch over the grilling meat, licking their lips.

The smell of the cooking meat makes my mouth water. We drink more wine. Someone produces a plate of Georgian speciality Khachapuri (a hot and greasy bread, filled with a salty cheese called Sulguni). Georgi chops an onion and some tomatoes, adds salt and oil, puts the bowl on the table, along with a couple of loafs of fresh, crusty white bread.

The first of the pork arrives, carried into the house on skewers.

Some of the boys stay outside, grilling more meat. The rest of us sit around the table.

Georgi fills everyone’s glass with more wine. No cutlery, we eat with our hands. Cut the larger pieces of meat with a Swiss army knife.

Somebody shouts: “Gaumarjos!”

Georgi explains it means Cheers! in Georgian and is used to make a toast. A Gaumarjos must be given before every swig of drink.

We raise our glasses, “Gaumarjos friends!” is said in three languages - Georgian, Russian and English - and we sink our drinks in one.

Georgi pours everyone another glass and we Gaumarjos family.

I proceed to eat my own bodyweight in dead pig, as more glasses of wine are poured, this time women getting the Gaumarjos treatment.

Soon we have run out of things to Gaumarjos.

Friends, women, family, Georgia, Adina, mothers, fathers, brothers, sisters, animals, pork, the wine – everything has been Gaumarjos’d, always in three languages.

The boys from outside carry in a large plate of grilled fish and join us at the table.

“Gaumarjos ryba!” I shout, (Cheers to fish!)

“Gaumarjos ryba!” everybody shouts back, and the glasses are filled once more.

The feasting and drinking continue into the night.

Adina stopped downing her wine a long time ago and is pretending to take a sip each time a new Gaumarjos is made. I continue to match the boys glass for glass.

I stand up to make my way to the outhouse and almost fall through the door. Adina follows me outside into the pitch-black night.

“Are you alright?” she asks.

I tell her I'm fine, propping myself up against the side of the house, totally wasted.

Georgi welcomes me back to the table by handing me my glass, freshly filled. Someone carries another full container of the potent liquid into the room, even though we have only just started on container number three.

“Gaumarjos, um... Gaumarjos zhenskiny!” – We are Gaumarjosing women again.

Unexpectedly, one of the men says, “Kris, hashish?”

I hear myself saying, “Pochemu nyet?” (Why not?)

Adina turns to me slowly, raises her eyebrows: “Really?”

The man pulls a bag of potent smelling hash from his pocket, places it on the table, takes out his pouch of tobacco and papers, rolls a strong spliff. Passes it to me.

Its effects, combined with the alcohol, quickly take a hold, as the room begins to spin.

Soon, three spliffs are being passed around the table simultaneously.

One of the younger men at the table is in the Georgian army and fought against the Russians in the war of 2008. At the behest of the young soldier we Gaumarjos peace.

Georgi stands up and makes his way towards the small storage room. Before disappearing inside, he turns to us and says, “Kris … bang bang?”

“Where's he gone? What's going on now?” Adina says.

I tell her I think he’s gone to get a—

Standing over us, grinning like a madman, Georgi is brandishing a shotgun.

“Kris, you're not going to shoot that! No! This is not a good idea! You’re so drunk you can hardly stand! Do not start playing with guns!”

I tell her I am going to play with the gun.

I stand up and follow Georgi out the door, while the other boys laugh at Adina's sighs.

Georgi places the gun in my hands, shows me how to unlock it.

I point it up at the sky, click it back, pull the trigger.

BOOM! 

Almost blows my eardrum.

Everyone, except Adina, pisses themselves laughing.

I hand the gun back to Georgi and instantly regret it, as paranoia sets in. The sight of Georgi with gun in hand and homicidal grin on face convinces me we’re going to die.

I sit back down as Georgian chatter flows around me, the men laughing in conspiratorial fashion. They’re going to rape Adina and make me watch, then kill us.

I Keep my eye on the shotgun: as soon as Georgi puts it down, I’ll grab it.

One of the boys asks in serious tone if I need to sleep. I wave his suggestion away.

“Spat v svoyem domye,” Georgi tells me, pointing to one of the men. (Sleep at his house.)

I stand up, wish everybody goodnight, then stagger out the door, followed by Adina and the man who is going to take us to his home. We jump into a Land Rover and drive for five minutes up a bumpy mud path until we reach a secluded house.

With the guidance of a torch, the man leads us up the outside stairs, into a guesthouse in the attic. He shows us to the bedroom and says he’ll come for us in the morning.

I kick off my shoes, fall onto the bed, black out.

The cock-a-doodle-doo of a cockerel jolts me awake. Sunshine fills the room, no curtains to block it out. I check the time on my phone: 5 a.m.

My head is going to explode. The painkillers are in my backpack, at Georgi’s.

I crawl down the outside stairs and across the field to use the hole in the ground. Then lie wide awake in my own personal hell for the next few hours, head pounding me into submission, Adina sleeping peacefully at my side.

I stumble down the stairs, wash my face with cold water from the well in the field.

The owner of the house pulls up in his Land Rover, drives us back to Georgi's.

All the boys from last night are sitting around the table, drinking wine and cognac, eating fresh Khachapuri, looking like they've slept for twelve hours.

“Kris, Adina, cognac?”

I refuse the cognac but take the glass of wine forced into my hand and use it to swallow a couple of paracetamols.

“Gaumarjos friends!”

We sit and eat Khachapuri, drink more wine, I accept a cognac.

Georgi wants to drive us to a bus station and buy our tickets to Armenia, to guarantee our safety. We turn down his generous offer, it’s a beautiful day for hitchhiking.

The goodbye is quick but emotional.

We waddle alongside the river Kura, hunched under backpacks, till we find the main road that leads to Armenia. From there, we’ll hitchhike across the border.

On a personal level and for personal reasons perhaps, it’s my favourite piece I’ve ever written.

—

IT HAD JUST STARTED to drizzle as I emerged from the bookies out onto the narrow street. In among the sea of people, all with somewhere to be and no time to spare. Some tried to open umbrellas, before quickly giving up as they realised there was no space for it.

I pulled the packet of Camel Blue from the back pocket of my jeans, inadvertently discarding an old bus ticket and a little red bookies’ pen to the pavement in the process.

“May I have one of those, please?”

The voice was timid. At first I wasn’t sure where it had come from, but then I saw her sitting on the ground by my feet.

“Sorry, but that was my last one. I suppose I could fish it out of that puddle, if you want it that badly,” I said with a straight face.

What began as a quick closed-mouth smile grew rapidly into a broad grin that showed her clean teeth. But then she caught reflection of herself in the shopfront glass window and quickly closed up again.  

“Aah… you meant a cigarette?” I said, now also grinning, “I’m sorry, I thought you meant an old bus ticket.”

I handed her a Camel, she put it between her lips and I lit it for her. She took a long deep drag, held the smoke in her lungs for a few seconds, turned her head to the side and exhaled the white cloud slowly. Then she turned back to me and said, “You can understand me, can’t you?”

What a strange question. But all I said in response was, “It seems that way, yea.”

“Are you a dog, too?” she said.

I took a drag on my cigarette and, while doing so, looked more closely at my new acquaintance. She had large, oval-shaped eyes, Caribbean blue, mesmerising. Clear skin that looked like silk. Long and wavy deep red hair that stuck to her forehead because of the damp. She was dressed in a hooded red woollen coat that came down to just below the waist.

I looked into her eyes: two brightly lit tunnels that stretched all the way to a dark past. Somehow an innocence had prevailed. Let’s call it naivety. I couldn’t tell you her age: could have been 21, could have been 31. Thin. Too thin to be healthy.

“You are the first one that has been able to understand me all day,” she said. “All these humans do is either ignore me completely, pretend I’m not here, that I don’t exist; or they smile patronisingly at me as they hurry past. I hate humans.”

It was then that I noticed she was tied to a bicycle rack by a metal lead around her neck. I looked up and saw that my bus, the number 17, had pulled into the stop and was letting people on. I decided I would wait for the next one.

I bent my knees and squatted next to her, to put myself at her level, and said, “This is my favourite time of year. And my favourite time of day. Late autumn, just before the sun goes down. I love the crispness.”

And, before waiting for her to respond, I said, “Who tied you up and left you here?”

“Alan,” she said. “He always comes back for me. Eventually.”

“But it’s getting cold. And you’re shivering. And you’re tied up like a dog. Outside a shop. Next to other dogs. And bikes,” I said.

“It’s because he loves me,” she said. “He does love me. Do you like this coat?”

“I do. It’s very nice. And it looks warm, too,” I said.

“You see! Alan loves me. He bought me this coat,” she said.

“It’s a beautiful colour,” I said.

“What’s a colour?” she said.

I stood up for a moment, took the packet of Camels from my back pocket, knelt back down and put another cigarette between her lips. Then I shifted my position and sat next to her, facing the world. We watched the people all huddled together under the bus shelter trying not to get wet. Some would catch my eye, but then quickly look away.

I leant over to the railings and untied the lead. Then I lifted the other end over her head and threw it into the kerb.

“I prefer spring,” she said. “When you first stop needing your coat in the evening. And when the rain brings out the smell of the flowers.”

“Come on, let’s go,” I said, and held out my hand.

Without questioning my move, she took my hand, stood up and followed me to the bus-stop. The number 17 pulled in and we stepped onto it together.

“I’m sorry, but no dogs allowed on this bus,” the driver informed us, as I attempted to buy two tickets.

“You what, mate? She’s travelling with me. And she’s not a fucking dog!” I barked.

But the driver ignored me completely and spoke only to the girl: “Look, I really am sorry, love, but I can’t let you bring him on the bus. Not at rush hour, and not when it’s raining.”

I snarled, confused, unable to understand. I took this bus home every other day. I even recognised the driver.

“What are you saying? Why are you doing this? It's me! You know me!” I pleaded.

The driver just looked at the girl sympathetically and said, “I’m sorry. I really am. But would you mind getting him off my bus now, please? You’re holding us all up.”

Without thinking, I undid my flies, took out my thing and started pissing on the floor and up the side of the driver’s little door.

“OH FOR FU- THAT’S DISGUSTING! JUST GET HIM OFF NOW!” The driver shouted.

The girl and I stepped off the bus and as it pulled away the faces stared at us through the steamed up windows.

“How far is it to yours?” she said.

"Not too far,” I said, “but we'll need to stop off for more cigarettes on the way. I’m almost out.”

—

Over to the judges:

Bosnia, 2017

I JUMP OFF A TRAM in the neighbourhood of Otoka, an old-school concrete jungle of grey Communist high rises, far from the city centre of Sarajevo.

Otoka looks and feels tough, the atmosphere surly and boisterous, nothing like the parts of the city where you might find tourists. Behind the tram station is a bridge lined with a mixture of old peasants and gypsies, selling whatever they have laid out on the ground in front of them: socks, slippers, onions, little bags of lavender.

I find the block I am looking for and read the plaque fixed to the side of the building: “In this spot on the 9th of December 1993, Serbian criminals killed three citizens of Sarajevo.”

A tall man in his late fifties, with a goatee beard and wearing a dirty green trench coat, is standing in the doorway of the building. He is Mišo, my Airbnb host, and he greets me in heavily accented English.

Together we cram into the tiny lift and Mišo presses the button for the sixth floor. His breath smells of a combination of cigarettes, stale brandy, and vomit.

Mišo (pronounced Meesho), is the first person in Bosnia since I arrived two weeks ago not to make me take my shoes off on entering his home. The flat is modest. Mišo lives in the living room, there is a kitchen at the back, and then, behind a shower curtain installed for privacy, are the two guest bedrooms and a shared bathroom.

One room is mine, the other, Mišo tells me, is occupied by a Bosnian girl who has rented it for the New Year celebrations taking place tomorrow.

“I have to ask you to not walk around with no clothes on,” Mišo tells me deadpan. “I have told her the same.”

After I am settled, Mišo knocks on my door and invites me to drink rakija in the living room. He offers me a choice between the apple, plum and grape varieties. I tell him in his language that I'll take the jabukovača, the apple one. He asks how I know the word. Without switching back to English I tell him that I speak a bit of the language and that I am in Bosnia taking a course at a local language school to improve my level.

Mišo pauses for a moment.

Then he asks: “And what language do they say they are teaching?”

I tell him, “They call it BCS. Bosnian-Croatian-Serbian.”

Mišo snorts, wags his finger and says: “Ha! Well that's not too bad! But I should tell you, there is no such language as Bosnian. You know that? It is Serbo-Croatian language. Or Serbian.”

I tell him I don't get involved in the politics of naming it.

Mišo pours the drinks, sits down, and offers me a non-branded bootleg cigarette from a little polythene bag. I quit smoking years ago but I take one to be polite. Mišo lights it for me. Then he speaks.

“You know, the term Bosniak...” He pauses for effect. “It is controversial. I am not happy with this word. We Serbs are Serbs... Croats are Croats, fine… but Bosniaks... Huh! You know..." He pauses again, curves his mouth down at the ends, raises his eyebrows and shrug his shoulders. “You know? Anyway I don't want to talk about that. But it's a controversy.”

On the wall is a black and white photo of Mišo's parents when they were young. I ask him if he has always lived in Sarajevo. He has, apart from during the Bosnian war, when he went to Montenegro.

I wonder inwardly how it feels to be a Serb living in a building with that plaque on the wall outside. I have spent a lot of time listening to Sarajevans' war memories over the years, but am yet to hear a Bosnian Serb point of view.

I ask Mišo if there are many Serbs living in the neighbourhood.

“Not anymore,” he says. “Before the war this area was majority Serb, but most were forced to leave.”

I ask how relations are now between the communities: “Is it like before the war, that people aren't interested in what religion their neighbour is, or...”

Mišo doesn't appreciate my line of questioning and interrupts me.

“You know, I get very angry when people still want to talk about or even think about the war. It is the past. History. Why would I want to think about all that now?”

His voice is deep and his posture aggressive, although non-threatening. The rakija burns the throat as it goes down. The bootleg cigarette dries the tongue.

Mišo continues: “When I think about the war, it makes me sick in the stomach. People should just move on. Forget about it. Stop remembering the past and look to the future. Bosnians are always looking at the war. That is their problem: they cannot move forward. Why still care? Why still remember?”

I decide that I will push him more on the subject when the time is right, but right now it is not. Instead I ask him what he does in life. He tells me he is a poet.

“Do you make money from writing?” I ask.

“No.”

Ha! Who does?

Bitterness punctures his voice as he tells me he has been unemployed since 2002 and that no one will give him a job because he has never been a member of any political party. He becomes animated. “It's bullshit! All fucking bullshit!” Before calming himself and saying that he manages to make ends meet by tutoring maths and chess.

Later that evening I come back to the flat to find that my key won't open the door and nobody is home to let me in. I go to the small café next door, order a pljeskavica (similar to a burger) and text Mišo to let him know I am locked out. He turns up after twenty minutes and apologises profusely—he gave me the wrong key—and then insists on paying for my dinner and won't take no for an answer.

A couple of evenings later, I return to the flat after drinking a large jug of Bosnian wine with my dinner and Mišo tells me that we will visit his cousin who makes rakija the following morning at 9. It will be my first visit to the part of Sarajevo that sits in Republika Srpska territory. I pack my bags, as tonight is my last at Mišo’s.

The morning sky is grey and the air is wet with drizzle as we get into Mišo's car and set off for Eastern Sarajevo.

It is just a ten-minute drive to the invisible line that separates the country's two entities. You know when you have crossed to the other side because all advertisements, road signs and even graffiti have switched from the Latin alphabet to Cyrillic. Apart from that, there is no official sign saying you have crossed into a different territory. Mišo tells me that in all other parts of Bosnia there are big signs along the border, but they decided it was for the best to keep it low-key in Sarajevo.

We climb the hill and enter the outskirts of a built-up residential area, full of newish blocks of flats, orange-coloured, ugly. Serbian flags hang from windows and balconies. A piece of graffiti on our right mocks the siege of Sarajevo: "Pazi Snajper" (Beware of sniper)—the warning that was painted all along sniper alley during the war—with a large smiley face next to it.

A bit further into the entity we pass a large mural on the side of a residential building, dedicated to Gavrilo Princip—the young Bosnian Serb who in 1914 shot and killed the Archduke Franz Ferdinand, triggering the start of the First World War—and also dedicated to the local football team that represents Sarajevo's Serbs, Slavija. Most Serbs see Princip as a hero, while to most Bosniaks and Croats he is a terrorist.

Soon we hit a residential estate of identikit semi-detached houses, none of which seems completely finished. Mišo tells me the whole neighbourhood was built from scratch at the end of the war to host Serbs who didn't want to live in the Federation.

We roll up to Mišo’s cousin's house. Nikola is 50 years old and barrel-chested. He looks younger than his years. His handshake is tight. Immediately he takes me into the garage which houses his distillery and explains in Serbian—he claims not to be able to speak English—the process of turning fruit into rakija, before inviting us into his home for a drink. The two men lead me to a couple of sofas at the back and sit me down in front of the large screen TV, set to a music channel playing turbo folk.

On the wall above my head is a small shrine to an Orthodox saint. The Orthodox cross can be found in numerous places around the living room, as can old black and white pictures of important cathedrals.

Nikola offers me a choice of rakija or wine, white or red, all of which are made in the garage. It is too early in the morning to be starting on the rakija so I opt for red wine. Nikola pours a huge glass and hands it to me, then pours rakija for Mišo and himself.

“Sit back,” Nikola instructs me. “Make yourself at home.”

Mišo leans in close to me and says: “Now I want to ask you about the war. Tell me, for you, the war in Bosnia was a civil war or it was a war with an aggressor?”

The question knocks me off guard. Both men are staring at me, waiting for an answer.

I take a large swig of wine, swallow it, then say slowly, “There was aggression.”

It is not what they expect to hear. I am an outsider, in Republika Srpska, inside the home of a Bosnian Serb, drinking the man's wine...I am supposed to toe the line.

“So just who was the aggressor?” Mišo asks, angrily.

“I see the Bosnian Serbs, backed by Serbia, as the aggressors,” I say.

I put my glass to my lips and think about what I am doing. Do I want to be going down this road? The atmosphere is tense. I didn't need to make it so. I could still fix it by telling them what they want to hear. But I can't do it. I have nothing against Serbs—it's bullshit that I have a problem with.

“How can you say it was a war of aggression, when I am from Bosnia, I am Bosnian, this is my land as much as it is any Muslim's, I am not from outside, I am not from Serbia, I am a Serb but I am from here, my family goes back generations and generations of Bosnians from this land. It was a civil war!” Nikola says, demonstrating that he wasn't being entirely truthful when he said he didn't know English.

Mišo takes over from his cousin: “The Serbs were the victims in the war. In our ancestral village all Serb men and boys were massacred by the Muslims. Nikola was 25 at the time and was there. He only survived because he managed to escape through the mountains over a couple of nights and reach Serbian territory. On the way he touched a landmine and was lucky not to lose his whole leg. He was badly wounded.”

Nikola pulls up a trouser leg and shows me the scar.

I ask who laid the mines.

“They were Serb mines,” Nikola admits, his face showing appreciation for the irony.

Mišo shouts that this whole suburb, Eastern New Sarajevo, was built after the war to house displaced Serb refugees.

“So tell me how it was a war of aggression! It was Bosnian against Bosnian! Everybody in that war was from here and was fighting for their land! There was no outside hand!”

“That's not true,” I say. “When the war started, it was waged by the Yugoslav National Army, in Serbia's interests, ordered by Slobodan Milošević. The Bosnian Serbs were supported by the Government of Serbia and the Yugoslav National Army, as well as paramilitary units from Serbia. They had all the weapons, all the hardware and all the manpower. It wasn't a fair fight.”

“What should we have done?” Nikola asks, laughing. “Destroy our weapons? Or share them with the enemy? Should we have said Hold on, this is not fair, we have more weapons than you, we don't want to fight until it's even? That's not how war works!”

I say, “You asked me a question. I gave you an answer.”

Nikola says, “OK, no more talk of war. How do you like the wine?”

“It's delicious.”

He pours me another glass and tells me about the time he spent working abroad, in Afghanistan, Iraq, Djibouti, Kenya. He has been all over, contracted by the US military, building installations for them. He is looking forward to them calling him again and sending him away, because it pays well and gives him something to do.

He asks my opinion on Brexit. I tell him it is stupid. He says it is a good thing for Britain because they will be able to control who comes into the country. He illustrates his view with a story from his time in Iraq. His best friend on the compound was an Iraqi guy. The Americans had to employ local Iraqis so that there would be less attacks on the base. They also had to pay the local insurgents a million dollars not to attack them. Anyway, the one day the Iraqis weren't on the base, there was a suicide bombing that killed some Americans. The bomber was Nikola's Iraqi best friend.

“You see, you can never tell who is good and who is bad until it's too late,” he tells me.

“How would tighter border control have made any difference to that situation?” I ask.

The two men look at each other, fail to come up with any answer, so change the subject onto their plan for turning the upstairs of the building into a guesthouse for tourists. They want me to write the Airbnb listing for them, make it sound appealing. Nikola tells me he has got a small minibus that, for a fee, he could take guests on excursions in, up into the mountains.

As I listen, I am fed ham, salami, smoked cheese and fresh bread, all produced by Nikola and his neighbours. The ham is the tenderest I have ever tasted.

They take me out into the garden and show me the vegetable patch inside the greenhouse, with the homemade irrigation system that catches rainwater and runs it through pipes under the ground before spreading it evenly over the vegetables. Nikola is totally self-sufficient. They tell me to write about it in the listing, to let people know that they would only be eating and drinking home produce.

Every time my glass is almost empty, Nikola fills it. I write the listing for them, but I am sure tourists won't come. People visit Sarajevo to walk around the Turkish quarter.

Tourists don't come to Eastern Sarajevo. It is too far from everything, and is poorly connected. There is nothing to see apart from houses, all built within the last twenty years. Still, I wish Nikola luck. He is a good host and an amicable man.

The three of us continue drinking heavily. Eventually it is time to leave, but not before Mišo talks me into buying a bottle of wine from Nikola for 10 Euros. It is still late morning but feels more like late afternoon, on account of all the drinking. I have polished off a bottle of wine on my own. Mišo has been knocking back rakija without pause and is showing the effects.

I follow Mišo as he sways towards his car, and we both get in. He starts the engine. I tell myself: Fuck it; if we die we die. Mišo starts driving and as we move through the streets he slurs stories that have no beginning and no end.

Close to that Gavrilo Princip mural, I spot a statue of the man, along with a miniature amphitheatre dedicated to his remembrance, set in the middle of all these ugly blocks of flats. The statue bears little resemblance to the man.

I return to the car after taking a photo to find Mišo stood in the middle of a patch of grass, dick in hand, pissing into the wind.

I ask him: “Was Princip a hero?”

“Yeah he's a hero. Of course he's a hero. The Austrians were only here to take our money and to colonise. So yes, he is a fucking hero!”

Mišo says he wants to say hello to some friends before we leave. I follow him to an inconspicuous glass door at the foot of a block of flats. The door enters into a tiny bar, standing room only, other than for a little table by the door, around which are sat a woman and three men, all chain smoking, drinking, talking, and laughing.

The woman stands, greets us and goes behind the bar. She is in her mid forties and wearing a hoodie. Her face is that working-class blend of motherly and tough. She seems reluctant in her acceptance of Mišo grabbing her by the shoulders and kissing her three times on the cheeks to wish her a Happy New Year. The three men at the table alternate between paying us no attention and eyeing us suspiciously, as if we have intruded on a secret meeting.

Mišo introduces me to the group. They nod their heads to acknowledge my existence.

The woman pours us each a pint of red wine, which has been watered down and tastes like it has been sat in an open bottle for weeks. I pay for the two of us. The woman rejoins the table, leaving us to stand quietly at the bar with our nauseating wine. I get the feeling the regulars are not happy to have an outsider in the place. Mišo keeps trying to join in the conversation they are having, but they blank him completely. It is awkward to watch, not least because Mišo has just been telling me these are his dear old friends. They seem like the complete opposite. I start to pity Mišo. He is no longer the brash alpha but rather the unpopular kid at school that nobody wants to play with.

Mišo tells me that the guy sat next to the landlady drives the bus from East Sarajevo to Belgrade. I look at him in his bus company uniform, boyish face and expression, skinny chest, round beer belly—like a little boy sat on a barrel, slurring his words and swaying from side to side, smoking a cigarette. He is wasted.

Jokingly I ask: “Is he driving today?”

“Yes, later this afternoon,” Mišo replies seriously.

The landlady is in love with the bus driver. She keeps touching his hair, his face, his knee, and pulling him close for drunken hugs. The love appears to be unrequited.

Now more drunk than when we arrived, we walk to the car. It is still only midday and the weather is still miserable. We start driving back towards the Federation, as Mišo tells me what good people I have just met.

“They seemed a little put out by our presence,” I suggest.

“No, not at all. They are good people. Nice people. They have no problem with anyone. But they are Serbs, this is how it is in Republika Srpska. People here don't do the pretend niceness of the Muslims in the city centre. They mind their own business. But they are good people.”

After a few minutes, Mišo pulls the car over and tells me he is going to buy cigarettes, do I want to come? No I'll wait. He wanders up the road and into a bar. Five minutes later he steps out of the bar and waves for me to join him. He wants me to meet another of his friends is code for he wants another drink. The bar is only slightly larger than the one we just left. Sat at the table are three hard-looking older men, dressed in hoodies, talking amongst themselves in deep voices.

At the bar is the friend Mišo wants me to meet, who says to me in Serbian: “You are really an Englishman? In Eastern Sarajevo?” He pauses to laugh, before finishing: “You are the first. Your people never come to see us.” Then he laughs some more.

Mišo orders two glasses of wine from the silent barman, as well as three packets of homemade cigarettes, twenty in each little polythene pack.

He pays for the cigarettes and then turns to me holding the bill for the wines and says: “Oh my god, 10 marks, it's so much! I don't have money.”

“Don't worry,” I say, reaching for my wallet, “I've got it.”

Mišo's friend tells me his trade is air conditioning installation but that he hasn't had work for a long time. He points through the window to the football stadium directly opposite and tells me it is the home of Slavija Sarajevo, the team for the Serbs.

“The Muslims have their teams in the city. And we Serbs have our team here: the greatest in Bosnia,” he tells me.

I stand quietly and finish my wine while the two men drunkenly talk politics and the barman stands behind the bar smoking and looking bored.

We say our goodbyes and stagger to the car. The short drive back to the Federation will be the last minutes I spend with Mišo. I know he is drunk enough to talk candidly, so I ask him what he can tell me about his experience of the war.

He points to the field on our left.

“Just here, next to the football stadium, was the barracks of the Army of Republika Srpska. I remember the tanks parked here like it was yesterday. And all the soldiers. All the people. This is where the Serbs of Sarajevo came to escape the city. And right here was the frontline,” he says, pointing to just up ahead.

“Did you come here?” I ask.

“I spent the first three months of the war inside the city. Then I paid some people to get me across the line to the Serb side. I lived for a few months right here, right next to the Slavija stadium, until I was able to pay some more people to get me to Montenegro, where I stayed until after the war. I came back in 1997.”

"How did it all feel?” I ask.

“You know I told you, it makes me feel sick in the stomach to talk about the war.”

“Yes I know, I'm sorry, I'm just trying to understand. How did it feel?” I persist.

“OK, if you really want to know. The war was fucking shit. I still can't believe what happened to my city, OK?”

“How was it to return to Sarajevo after the war? How did people react to you?”

“Half the people were happy. Half were not. Half said Thank you for coming back, you are one of us, we are all Sarajevans. The other half said What the fuck? You run back and forth freely between the two sides. You got out and went on a holiday for years; left us here to suffer and die. You want the best of both worlds. Fuck you! But you know what, I am too old and too tough and I don't give a shit what people say.”

There is pain in Mišo's eyes and in his voice as he speaks.

I ask: “Did you know war was coming to Sarajevo? When Yugoslavia first started to fall apart, when fighting started in Croatia, did you have any idea then that it would spread to Bosnia?”

“None at all. When trouble broke out in Croatia, we thought it would be a ten, maybe fifteen-day problem. We never imagined it would turn into an actual war, and even less that the same could happen to our beautiful city.”

“You really had no idea?”

“Really! You know, my uncle was high up in the Yugoslav military and he called me some months before war broke out and told me to get out of Sarajevo because the shit was going to hit the fan. But I told him What are you talking about? I don't believe you. This is my town, this is Sarajevo, nothing bad will happen here. And he said No seriously, you have to leave. And I said No, it can't be! And then it happened. We were living in a war. I couldn't believe it then and I still can't believe it now.”

“So the Yugoslav Army knew months in advance that war was going to come to Sarajevo...” I say.

We finish the drive in silence and part with a handshake. I go my way, Mišo goes his.

Thanks for reading. Here’s another story from Bosnia, if you’re interested.

Danilo, my girlfriend's Slovenian father, is interested in purchasing some land in northern Bosnia, but needs to check out a few spots before committing. I agree to accompany him on the three-and-a-half-hour drive from Slovenia’s capital Ljubljana. We have completed the journey once before, but that time we had my girlfriend with us to act as interpreter. Today it is just him and me, a language barrier and the open road, as we set off just after 7am into a beautiful spring morning.

After a few wrong turns in Croatia, we find ourselves speeding along a seemingly endless dirt-track, dust flying from under our wheels into the bright green fields and tall trees that line our path. Behind them, rolling hills as far as the eye can see.

I am quietly admiring the serenity of nature, when my eyes fall upon a sign warning of land mines in the surrounding fields and woods.

I spend the remainder of our time on the track trying to clear my mind of images of peasant women collecting firewood for the family cottage and being blown to pieces. What if we swerve to avoid a pothole, go off the road and…

The end of the track returns us to normal roads and the border crossing into Bosnia. After some questions from Customs, the officer stamps my passport and waves us across the frontier.

Danilo is in familiar territory, he has been here many times over the past few months.

Our first stop is outside the town of Velika Kladuša in the north-western corner of the country. I get out of the car. The scene looks like every cowboy film I have ever seen: a dusty road, without pavement, scarcely lined with buildings; bars and shops that open directly onto the road—each one marked by bullet and shrapnel holes. We are high up in the hills. Below us green countryside dotted with half-finished hotels and mansions: “businessmen” who got out of Bosnia, returning to splash the cash.

I follow Danilo to a little bar with a few tables and chairs outside, where we are met by a smiling man who greets Danilo with a bear hug. Danilo introduces us and we sit down with bottles of Union beer, the taste of Ljubljana in a remote part of Bosnia.

As the men talk, I gaze into our surroundings and realise that, since crossing the border, I have seen many women going about their daily business, but not one has been accompanied by a husband. Apart from children and young teenagers (and our host), there seems to be no male inhabitants.

The man we are sitting with is Zlatan, a friend of Danilo’s. He is skinny, has no teeth, his veins pop out all over his arms and neck, and his face is as gaunt as it is gormless. I take him for a junkie.

“I speak a little English,” he tells me, in a thick accent.

“Where did you learn?”

“Here and there.” He shrugs. “I had to pick it up.”

There is a long silence as he stares into the clouds.

“You know, 14 years ago business was good here. Now, nobody comes. One is dead, one is killed, one is murdered, one has disappeared,” he says, monotonously. “Look at me. I am 41 but I look 55. War does that.”

After ten minutes of drinking beer in silence, Zlatan perks up.

“These days, I love my life. I do what I want, when I want. I have two women and three daughters, all in Croatia. Here I am a free man. Now we go to pick mushrooms.”

Zlatan points the way as Danilo drives us out into the forest. Zlatan turns around in the front seat to pass me a spliff. I decline his offer. Not because I’m against smoking weed, but because Zlatan has no teeth and, I'm ashamed to admit, the thought of putting between my lips what has just touched his gums turns my stomach.

We pull into some woods, park the car and trek up a steep hill through the trees. I get left behind as I struggle in my flip-flops. Suddenly I remember the land mines sign and freeze in my tracks. I spend the next twenty minutes standing under a tree.

I hear Danilo’s voice calling me from somewhere among the trees. When he finds me I see that he knows as much about picking mushrooms as I do: his bag is empty. We look at each other and laugh. Carefully, we walk back down to where we parked the car and wait for Zlatan, who emerges ten minutes later, chuckling loudly, his bag overflowing with huge, white mushrooms.

On the drive back I ask if mines are a big problem in the woods.

“No, no, don’t worry about mines, they aren’t a problem. They are almost all cleared from this area now.”

I breathe a sigh of relief.

He grins. “It’s the bears that you have to look out for!”

We sit down with more beers outside Zlatan’s bar while he disappears inside, returning ten minutes later with a plate of fried mushrooms and hot dogs. We feast.

After eating, Zlatan says he has something he wishes to show us, and leads us behind his building to a patch of plants.

“This is where I grow my shit.”

He picks some leaves and puts them into his pocket. This is his freedom.

The back of Zlatan’s house is more shrapnel-ridden than the front.

“When the Bosnian army were here in the war, they took over my house and my bar and used it as their headquarters.”

Soon, it is time to move on. We bid Zlatan farewell. Twenty minutes later we are in a tiny hillside village, close to the town of Cazin, that I recognise, having stayed here on my previous visit. We turn off towards the unlit dirt-track that leads down to the familiar little farmhouse, passing women picking vegetables from fields and children kicking footballs around, as lazy cows and sheep look on, feigning interest.

The middle-aged woman with workman’s hands looks surprised to see us. She stops toiling in the field and walks over to the car, a huge smile on her face. She invites us in and before I know it I am sitting on her settee drinking more Union while she brews up some strong Bosnian coffee in the corner of the room. I met her the last time I was here: the sister of one of Danilo’s workers. Her two plain-looking daughters, both in their late teens, sit in the corner sending text messages to their boyfriends working in Germany and Austria, waiting for them to come and whisk them away to a more exciting life. In between sending and receiving texts, the girls motion with their hands the international sign for “Another beer?”

The woman with the workman’s hands has no husband; the dreaming teenage girls and their little brother, no father. The war took him from them.

These people work from dawn till dusk and have virtually nothing to show for it, and yet, when a guest shows up, however unexpected, they lavish upon him whatever he desires. I am treated like a returning son. The love and warmth is overwhelming. And all it takes is a few inexpensive presents for the family — a tin of biscuits; a toy for the child — for these kind-hearted people to well up with tears of appreciation.

In the late afternoon we take the 11-year-old son to nearby Ostrožac Castle, built in the 1500s by the Ottomans, while the mother and two daughters prepare dinner.

The meal is delicious: roast chicken, potatoes, soup, bread and vegetables, all ingredients produced on the farm. But it is difficult to eat when the family of women just sit around us on the floor with nothing, watching us tuck in, waiting should we desire something more. They won’t eat until both guests are full and satisfied. They won’t take care of their own hunger—a hunger built up by a life of constant manual work—until they have first taken care of ours.

“Eat, please!” I gesture, but all three women just smile politely and shake their heads.

Thanks for reading. Here’s another story from Bosnia, if you’re interested.