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Scottish Mother

In 1971 I met an Algerian man in my home town of Glenrothes.

He had come to Scotland to learn the papermaking industry and return to his own country to help set up a new papermaking factory in Algeria. We fell in love very quickly and by April 1972 we were married and living there.

I became quite lonely and we returned to Glenrothes with our two children and set up home in Woodside. I had never known what racism was and in those days no one even spoke about it.

At first I could not understand why our family was being treated so badly. Nothing overt, just nasty comments and whispering in shops and sometimes in the street.

Then my children went to school and the name-calling and stone-throwing started.

What amazed me was that it was from children of five years old. How did they know my children were different? They did not look different and did not talk differently.

Interestingly it seemed to come from the children who had older brothers and sisters and it was noticeable that my son's friends were all the oldest children in their family.

Finally, some boys of the same age and older beat up my son when he was playing then held him down and ran over him with their bikes repeatedly. It was the last straw. There was no point in going to the police then although I would if I saw it happening to anyone now.

We moved to Kirkcaldy and started afresh. It wasn't that people in Kirkcaldy weren't racist, simply that we hid our background. My husband had gone back to Algeria by that time, as the strain was just too much. We were in a new environment where no one knew anything about us. It was the best thing that we could have done.

I grew up in Glenrothes and all my friends were there and OK, it is not a million miles away but I still feel angry about the people who made life so bad there and the boys who will now have families of their own who bullied my children.