My mum meticulously documented my entire childhood. There’s not a birthday, Eid or holiday that doesn’t have a dedicated album and every now and then I thumb nostalgically through them. For a long time I viewed my Britishness, Somaliness and Swedishness as something I had to choose between. At home I was Somali Fatin, at school I was British “Fateen” and the inconvenience of having been born in Sweden kind of lingered in the background. I thought, in a very pre-teen fashion, that I had no lessons to learn from my parents because their upbringing was so different to mine. I even viewed my experience as distinctly different to my brothers and my sisters’ because, well, I was a bit of a brat.
My parents both spent the first few years of their lives in rural parts of Somalia then moved to Mogadishu. They attended the National University of Mogadishu in the 80s (where they met) and, as a result of civil war, have spent a large portion of their adult lives outside of Somalia. They’ve lived in Somalia, Egypt, Italy, Sweden and England
My earliest memories are in the flat I grew up in.
I first met my grandmother in 2007. She’d lived in Somalia her entire life and, at aged 70, moved to the UK to live with us. She was Somali through and through. Somali was the only language she spoke and the only culture she’d been immersed in for nearly three quarters of a century. An absolute contrast to my melting pot of conflicting ideals and mismatched customs.
My grandparents probably never imagined that a grandchild of theirs would grow up in England and struggle with their native tongue. At my age my parents never imagined they would live in the UK today. But that’s what happened and a significant lesson I have learned from the past generations of my family is to live and love the circumstances life throws at me. Check out the gallery of my favourite pictures from some of our family albums.
IN THIS HEIRLOOM: 'MY FAMILY AND I' SERIES OUR CREATIVES SHARE PERSONAL INSIGHTS INTO THEIR LIVES. FATIN REFLECTS ON LIFE LESSONS WITH A LOOK INTO PARENTS, PICTURES AND IDENTITY
by FATIN GULED
MY FAMILY AND I
MY FAMILY AND i:
LESSONS LEARNT