Chalkhill Estate. It was one of those ‘phantom’ council estates I’d heard about but never seen. It was always in the news for robberies, violent gang crime and drug scandals. As a child, whenever we drove through an area of Wembley remotely close to Chalkhill, my parents didn’t have to remind me, I already knew the drill: lock the car doors and be careful.
Paraphrased, Wikipedia says about Chalkhill:
By late the 1970’s, local shops were frequently robbed. The neighbourhood around Chalkhill was deteriorating, and criminal activities in the area soon seeped into the estate.
Milkmen, who had previously delivered to residents’ doors, had to restrict operations due to the uptick of robberies. The buildings were decaying. Lifts weren’t always operational, and the ones that worked often had a stench of urine.
Residents had no other option but to walk up dozens of flights of poorly lit concrete stairs. The two high-rise car parks were just as dangerous, rife with car thefts and drug deals.
The recreational facilities suffered as well. Children’s play areas, such as the paddling pool and sandpit, became unsafe due to the prevalence of broken glass. The flower beds and seating areas for the elderly were destroyed as fast as they were repaired. Gradually these facilities were decommissioned or replaced, only to be vandalised once again.
By the 1990s, Chalkhill Estate was infested with drugs and gangs.
In 1997, the 1,900 houses and flats were demolished, and a new low-rise estate was planned as replacement. Some of the old estate land was sold to Asda, who then built a large supermarket that opened in March 1999.
Despite the new layout and buildings, crime remained and gang presence increased. Multiple Chalkhill-area gangs arose, such as Crack Hill Mob and Chalk Hill Boys. The Press Road Crew remained notorious for crime in Chalkhill and surrounding areas. In 2003, seven members of the gang, with 100 convictions between them, were issued ASBOs.[9] Rivalry between the Press Road Crew and South Kilburn gangs resulted in the murder of 29-year-old Jason Greene in 2006.
There was an increase in reported incidents of youth robberies, shootings, and drug raids on the revamped estate throughout 2009–10. In January 2010, a young man was shot on the estate and left with a fractured skull after an incident on Chalkhill Road.
In 2011, three high-ranking members of a £20m drugs network … were jailed for a total of 22 years. During the police operation, £6m worth of heroin was recovered from a home on Chalkhill Road and in a nearby flat.
After being married into a prominent, multi-millionaire, religious Jain family and living in a nine-bedroom house on a private road backing onto a golf course, with every material comfort as a wife and mother I could ask for, would you believe, this very same Chalkhill Estate, in 2001, became my home.
How the hell did that happen?
Well, as I mentioned previously, I needed a place to live closer to the children. And the girl whose room I was occupying at Milli’s student house was returning to live there, so I didn’t have much time. Because Maanav hadn’t allowed me to stay in touch with anyone else, I had no other friends to turn to. The ones I had then were all Maanav’s friends’ wives and girlfriends, and so I couldn’t go to them. Going back to my parents’ home was also out of the question. I could only tolerate my father for a few hours a week whenever I took the children to visit him and my mother, and we all played happy families for Jai and Veer’s sake.
I was broke, too. I can’t remember if Maanav had stopped my bank cards from our joint account or if I had given them back to him; either way, I didn’t have money. I didn’t ask anyone, least of all my parents, to help me financially. I went to sign on for JSA (Job Seekers Allowance), which meant the state gave me around £40 per week to live off until I found employment. I was confident that once I figured out where I’d be living, I could find a job in that area.
I could easily have taken the children’s birth certificates to my local borough council, and they would have given me a place to live, probably a flat, big enough for my children and me, rent-free, as I would have qualified for housing benefit and other living support benefits. If I had done that, I wouldn’t have had to worry about anything, accommodation, food, etc. Most importantly, it would mean I could have had the children stay over with me more often and could have more time with them.
Maanav knew this, so, of course, he didn’t offer the birth certificates. And I didn’t ask for them. I knew it would be futile, and I couldn’t handle the conflict. (I read somewhere that often children who grow up in abusive households grow into either very aggressive, angry adults or become so sensitive they’ll do anything to avoid conflict. I was the latter. I would do anything not to ‘rock the boat’ even if it were to my own detriment.) I did whatever Maanav and his family wanted. And I didn’t ask them for anything. At the time, I felt that everything was my fault, I deserved nothing, and I should be grateful for whatever they were offering me – including time with my children.
Concerning the divorce settlement, basically, there wasn’t one. I didn’t fight Maanav for anything. A rumour went around that my father-in-law had bought me a flat to live in. This is not true. In fact, my relatives in Kenya brought it up only last year. They all assumed it to be true up until last year when I told them it couldn’t be further from the truth. I didn’t take anything from them in a settlement, not one penny.
In any case, Maanav didn’t own anything in his own name; everything was in a trust, except for the factory. I knew it belonged to my father; it was only Maanav’s in name, and I wasn’t going to ask for a piece of it. Maanav and my father sorted out the factory between themselves. Maanav made a handsome sum from it.
Out of that, Maanav repaid the £7,000 career development loan I had taken out when I’d wanted to carve out a path for myself and not rely on anyone financially (I thought I was doing something noble, but that obviously didn’t work out). Maanav and his family let me keep my car and half of my wedding jewellery.
Only half, why? Maanav’s mother told me I had to return everything she and her family had given me, and I could keep what my family had given me. I had gone jewellery shopping with my mother-in-law, and all the items we’d bought were of my choice. She knew they were sets I loved and wore regularly. My mother-in-law told me that if I wanted to keep any of them, I had to give her the sets my mother’s brothers had gifted me on my wedding day.
I didn’t know what the traditions were, what was right or wrong, or if I was being wronged. All I know is that any time Maanav or his family told me I must or must not do something, I complied, without argument. I felt like a stupid child who didn’t know anything, who had made a big mess, and as it was all my fault, I had no say and had to let the grown-ups dictate matters. I didn’t ask anyone what my rights were. I didn’t get any legal advice or help at that time.
I remember when I was married and living at the house, my father-in-law was looked up to so much as the head of the community that whenever anyone had problems, even marital problems, they would come to him. I served drinks and snacks to them, so I listened a bit while my father-in-law carefully mediated a particular couple’s divorce. He made sure to help both parties get what was fair.
But when it came to me, I had zero guidance; I didn’t know where or whom to turn to. In fact, the signing of the divorce papers was done in such a shady way when I look back on it. It was done at their house, with just Maanav, his father, and me present. I trusted my father-in-law, and I had no lawyer, just as when we first went to court about the kids, I had no legal representation (I’ll write about this properly soon).
The only time my own father reached out to me to help me was to make a chart of living expenses to take to court and demand financial support from Maanav. There were a few extended family members in that meeting who I know meant well, but also didn’t understand the kind of help I really needed.
During the meeting, they were writing with markers on a large sheet of paper, listing items like rent, education, food, and a gym membership.
They were all focused on it, but my head was spinning. I felt invisible. I was having an anxiety attack just looking at it and listening to all the people around me, talking numbers, telling me I need this, I need that… it was too much.
“Stop!” I yelled. “I don’t want anything from him. The children live with him. If I’m taking from him, it means I’m taking from them. I don’t care how much money he has. I don’t need it. I will sort myself out. Please just stop all this.” I got up and left. They never bothered me about it again.
Throughout the separation and divorce, I felt my father was more concerned about money and his business than my well-being. If he or my mother tried to talk to me beyond Jai and Veer’s visits, I snapped at them. The truth was, I had walled myself off. There was too much pain. It was better to stay in my hole.
My brother had disappeared from my radar completely. The very few interactions we had rarely ended well. Either he had something nasty to say to me, such as calling me a whore, or he just wasn’t around much. We never spoke on the phone. We never asked each other how the other was doing. It wasn’t until years later that we found out he was struggling with his own abuse demons back then, too. Nobody realised what he was going through until the breakdown when the very red, red flags cropped up, and he became extremely unwell. (More on this in future chapters.)
So there I was, again, trying to figure it all out without family support.
Content to go it alone and used to it by then, when a friend of Milli’s heard I was homeless and looking for a place to live closer to my children, he took me to his cousin’s house in Chalkhill.
I sat on the sofa, and the cousin, a jolly guy, pointed to a bag of weed and rolling papers on the coffee table and said, “Help yourself.” I hadn’t smoked weed or rolled a joint for years. But it was like riding a bicycle. I felt right at home. I rolled one just as perfectly as I used to; the boys were impressed. As I took my first inhale, the cousin, who was called Saleem, said I could stay there. I didn’t hesitate.
So, Chalkhill, full of guns, gangs, drugs and police vans, ironically became my haven and home; a place where I could be someone new in a world I could completely lose myself in. I did exactly that.
And, of course, I fell in love with Saleem.