I remember seeing them, everyday, day in day out living thir normal lives. They wore different colours, different styles, over Asian clothes, English clothes and something in between. They were everywhere, it was a normal thing, I didn’t mind it in anyway, I just didn’t understand, why did they do it? How weird they cover themselves like that? I don’t know how I could ever do that, I loved my hair, loved it touching my shoulders, loved to feel the pony-tail swinging behind me and I loved flicking my fringe out of my face every so often. That scarf thing tied all over my head would make me feel so locked up, strangling my neck, how did they do it?

It’s like they lived their life, and we lived ours. The Asians were on one side, the rest of us separate. If you walked into the common room or a lecture hall, you would see an ‘asian’ corner and then a few ‘non-asian’ corners, and of course there would be those who strayed from the idea, but that may only be because they lived in that world. Nobody lived in both worlds, they were true to one or the other. Nobody tried to segregate us; we just don’t fully intermix, just naturally. We didn’t talk to them and they didn’t us, I don’t really know why.

That was, until one day I sat in the wrong place. I was overwhelmed in my own world, unaware that I had sat on their row, and they would come along in their group. Most times that normally happens; I would just be ignored, but not this time. Normally we wouldn’t mingle so freely, it would be just hi and bye or hey.

Anyway so she sat with me, all tied up in her scarf. Surprisingly, She was so nice and we really began to talk, she was completely normal, just like us, only her scarf differentiated her from me. We liked the same TV shows, same movies, had same thoughts on careers and everything, we just clicked. I began to realise that there really wasn’t much difference, she still had fun, and she still had haircuts and fringes just not on show. It did surprise me: what a waste of a good haircut, but still it was strange that this huge barrier had been broken. Our only difference was our lifestyle and part of our culture. It seemed as though she was carrying three cultures: her Pakistani origin, her british born culture and her growing faith in islam.