now he is here. And also he say Christmas in his country is not even in December, so he wants to try British one.
I’m like: ‘What? Christmas not in December? Are you serious?’
He goes: ‘It’s Orthodox Christmas.’ Always happens on seven of January. And for dinner they eat roasted goat, and panettone, you know? – it’s like Italian bread thing that is all light and soft and taste of lemons – and bowls of popcorn, and super-strong coffee, beans roasted fresh that day.
I’m like: ‘Mmm, sounds nice! Wanna make it for me?’
And he say okay, he will try to make one of each kind of dinner, one for British Christmas and one for Eritrea Christmas, if he can get others to chip in money. I’m thinking the guys will just laugh at him, but they pretty much all up for it! They each give him, like, four quid or something.
So, on Christmas Day we all get up to eat toast for breakfast, then sit around on cushions and mattresses and get drunk, smoke, start to watch stuff on morning TV, like It’s a Wonderful Life, and some film about snowman. Professor is sitting at table, chopping parsnips and potatoes – he got extra paper plates and cutlery so we can all eat at same time, and they are towered up on table next to him, all ready, and he’s got stuffing and cranberry sauce, and we’re all thinking, Yeahhhh, feast time soon, and getting hungry, you know…
And then there’s this BANG! Like proper explosion. Like bomb. And everyone’s like, What the fuck? Is this terrorist attack? Some guys scream, and we all look around, and Professor Jojo has fallen on floor on his back, and there’s flames coming out of microwave, like, big flames! Oh my God, such a stink, of like burning plastic, and raw meat splattered everywhere like some crazy baby thrown its purée around… I grab fire blanket, and we throw on water and put out fire, then we asking if Professor is okay, and what happen? He gets up slowly and says he’s okay, but he look shocked.
So I say to him again, like: ‘What happen?’
And he goes: ‘I don’t know, I just put chicken in to cook…’
And then Histoire is like: ‘Ow long for?’
And he goes: ‘Just one hour!’
And Histoire’s like: ‘Fucking idiot, look what you ’av done,’ – all angry. But I’m thinking, oh my God – putting chicken in microwave for one hour!!! Like, of course it’s gonna explode, and maybe blow up whole building, and this guy probably never even used microwave before in his whole life, and it is kind of amazing all of us not covered in chicken guts and on fire ourselves, this is like most hilarious thing ever happen in warehouse, maybe even in my whole life, and I start laughing and laughing, like I’m crying, and other guys all start laughing too, even Histoire, and even Professor Jojo. We tell him don’t worry, we don’t need no microwave, we can live on McDonald’s for a while! And Uncle will probably buy us new one anyway if we say it broke. Plus we can still eat rest of Christmas food, like stuffing and potatoes – by some miracle most of it is not covered in raw chicken. And actually it taste not bad. We give Professor big round of applause, then eat in front of Queen doing her boring speech, then fill up on mince pies, and life seems pretty good. For a day.
So, when Eritrea Christmas come around, Professor is still gonna go ahead with cooking special meal like they have back there, but he refuse to take money from guys this time round, even though we try to give to him – I think he’s feeling bad about explosion even though it was just mistake. He fry up sausages for us, and make popcorn in a pan and strong coffee, and he keep on saying sorry it is instant coffee, but we don’t care. He stew up apples with cinnamon to serve with sausages, and we all sit together again to eat – this is second time in two weeks, and I mean, most of guys in warehouse are bastards so far as I’m concern, and I never thought I’d be sitting to eat with them – but it did feel kind of nice, almost like family, just for couple of hours. Everyone does a big ‘cheers’ with drinks for chef.
But after, when Professor is washing up, I go to help him out, and he’s kind of quiet. I ask what’s wrong, and he says nothing, just thinking about family, what they’re doing, if they’ve had Christmas meal already. I can tell he’s homesick. All of us are, even if we hate our homeland, even if we never ever wanna go back. It’s still home, you know? So anyway, I just got phone as present from sisters (Uncle banned phones in there but I had mine hidden), so I offer Professor to call home on it if he wants, so he not have to go out to phone box to speak to his sister like usual. He’s super-grateful.
So he takes it to corridor, and when I go to take rubbish out, I hear him talking. It’s not like I expected, a Happy Christmas everyone! type of conversation – he saying he promise he’ll send money soon. After, I ask if everything’s okay. He tell me things are hard for his sister, cos she could get arrested any time, because of him. I’m like, woah, you like gangsta or something? And he’s like, no, it’s just he wrote article saying everyone shouldn’t all have to do military service their whole life, and because of that, they put him in jail, and when he escaped, they came to his house and threaten his sister and took all his shit. I’m like, oh. That is bad. And then he say his sister got a little daughter and no husband, and she’s got to look after their brother who got his legs blown off, and grandmother who can’t remember what she did ten minutes ago, and they all rely on him for money cos their parents are dead, and now government is after them for extra tax money, just cos he left! He got all worked up talking about it, then suddenly he stop and ask if we can talk about something else. So we did. But I remember it, and I had proper respect for Professor after that. Like, my life was lush compared to his, but he never complain like me, he just tell me about it that one time, and then just cos I ask about it. I reckon if I was him, with all that going on, I would be in some kind of big black depression, you know, drinking vodka with Russian guys every night and crying like baby.
So anyway, yeah, few months in, we good friends, and one day I look at Professor Jojo coming out of shower, and remember day one when he’s stick thin and stinking, and I’m thinking, Wow, you got muscles now! I don’t say nothing, but I’m like: I knew you would be hot. And one night soon after that, Alfonso (who thinks he’s Leonardo DiCaprio), he take Professor out to pull women. But Professor never come back after and go on about how he got laid, even though I know the girls went mad for him, cos Udaze said. He just said it was okay, but he can’t believe how one drink in pub cost more than ten cans from supermarket, and he not get how people expect you to buy rounds for everybody, so that was last time he doing that. I told him he don’t need to meet no girls in pub anyway, right, he’s already married – to books!
Actually, one day I feel bored and I start looking into one of his books, and thinking, hmm, like maybe I need to make more effort with education, all that shit. But a few pages of English and my head hurt! So I put it down, switch on TV. I’m more, like, people kind of guy. For me life is for living.
And then I’m like: wait, but if life is for living, how am I still here in this warehouse after six months? I tell myself, okay Emil, you gonna focus now. You need get out of here and live in proper apartment or house or something, so you can come out to people you living with, like this whole London thing supposed to be about. No way you can save enough money or meet new people with this shit pay.
So, that night I take all my savings and I’m like, right this is it, I don’t have any family to support like Professor, so I’m gonna take risk: I’m gonna go to G.A.Y. – you know, like biggest gay club in town – and I’m gonna party like it’s last night on earth and meet people who got better places to live and can help make my life different, somehow. I mean, it’s big gamble, I know. But I’m like, fuck it, I’m gonna do this one big night, for me, just how I want it, this one time, and it’s gonna be amazing. So I go there, and oh my God. SO much fun. I dance like crazy, I pull a couple of guys and I go back with one of them to his flat and, wow, I’m like, life is good right now, even if it’s shit again tomorrow.
But it actually works out! So, not too long after, one of my new friends tell me he play in this band and that’s how I got to join... actually, I probably would not even be doing that if Professor Jojo hadn’t come along. Let me explain.
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