This is the problem I've got
Okay, that's the problem I've got.
I'm British, and I'm proud of that.
But I'm also proud of my Sri Lankan heritage but I cannot connect with it and the reason I cannot connect with it is because I do not speak the language.
But I look like I should be able to speak the language, right?
This is an incredible Sri Lankan disguise, right?
If you’re white and you go the Sri Lanka, you got no problems because I just assume obviously you can't speak it
For me… it looks like I can speak it and they're extremely friendly people
As soon as we landed, they're talking to me..
So just like walking through the airport bump into someone.
[gibberish]
I'm so sorry mate…
I can barely understand Glaswegian, like there's no banter to be had here.
And then I can't even connect with my family.
That's a sad feeling for him to connect with my family because I only speak a bit of English.
I don't speak any Tamil.
So I'll meet an uncle and go
“Hello, Uncle.”
“Hello, Ramesh.”
“You're good?”
“Yeah, I'm good. You're good?”
“Yes.”
One of my uncle's gave me an insight into Sri Lankan culture, sort of accidentally.
He introduced me to his wife
Brought over this sort of portly Sri Lankan woman.
And then he goes
“Ramesh, this is my wife”
And I said
“Lovely to meet you.”
And then he goes
“Fat no?”
I look to her she's gonna
“Hahaha”
And I realize my mom's not the asshole, they all are.
No British hangups:
"You're fat. You're ugly. Who gets a share? We can still be mates."
This is the weird situation, the weird situation in my life..
Is that my mum and dad worried about my brother and I not being Srilankan enough.
Also, conversely, worried about us not being English enough, right.
And this is my mom was so worried about me growing up in this country right my mom and dad both so worried about me growing up in this country.
They gave me a secret weapon, right?
Don't worry.
It's not something I'm now going to detonate, alright?
It's much more innocent than that.
This is my secret weapon.
My first name is not Ramesh Ramesh is my middle name.
My first name is Jonathan.
[Audience laughs]
“Hahaha” Go f*** yourselves.
That's what it says on my birth certificate.
Now I didn't know that.
When I was at home as a little kid my mom and dad called me Ramesh,
You know the first time I found out what my name was…
Was my first day at school.
You know when the teachers got the registers.
Can you imagine that I just sat there like “what?”
First day of school is difficult enough as it is..
Without finding out you've got a secret identity.
I came home, I said to.. I can’t remember exactly what I said to my dad.
Something along the lines of “what is my name?”
And he said to me,
“Well, we don't want to have to discuss this with you this early on, but I will explain it to Ramesh.
(You know) In this country, there is discrimination and sometimes you don't get opportunities that you that you deserve because of your ethnicity.
So we thought you could use this name when you're applying for things..
and hopefully dodge the issue”
It's a very well intentioned plan.
I don't know how we thought that was gonna play out right
So I put that on an application form.
The guy looks at it and goes
“Ah! Jonathan Ranga Nathan. Must be a white guy, must be a white guy.
Let's get him. Let's get him in.
Finally a good old traditional English name.
This is great. I like the cut of his jib!
This guy, English fella, is a front runner.
I'll tell you that it's between him and Christopher Patel.
And then what shit happens at the interview.
I gotta meet somebody.
So I rock up there.
“Hello there. How are you?”
“I'm Jonathan.”
“You're Jonathan?! What the f*ck is going on? Have you seen him?”
“I thought he was the driver but he's actually the applicant because it looks like he literally just stepped off a boat”
“So it's actually you that's Jonathan, yeah? I can't f*cking believe this…”
“Can we just get that light up. No, he has that dark Jesus.”
“I blame you for this..we had exactly the same problem with Christopher.”
Anyway, I've digressed massively.
I'm in Starbucks.
Remember this, I'm in Starbucks.
I'm drinking my coffee. I'm on my laptop. I'm having a wonderful time, right?
I'm at a share table this woman walks in.
She orders her coffee.
She comes to sit down
She's got to sit near me because I'm at a shared table.
As she goes to sit down.
She knocks my coffee onto my laptop.
Breaking it instantly.
Then she turns to me and she goes
“Oh my god. I'm so sorry. Can I get you another coffee?”
"Yeah, that'll be great.
Thank you so much. I will have a MacBook-accino"
This is how Starbucks showed me how British I am right.
The woman spilt the coffee and I go,
“Oh my god. Well the important thing is… Are you okay?”
“Please don't worry about getting me another coffee. I just pour the coffee from the laptop back into my cup.”
“It is completely destroyed but at least I've made a friend”
I phoned my wife to tell her about it.
And I love my wife… very much.
But what I discovered is when something horrible happens to you, and you tell the person that you care about, more than anyone else in the world, about what happens…
every single thing they say is f*cking annoying.
Every single word that woman said made me want to punch a wall onto my knuckles.
“Is it broken?”
“Is it broken? If anything it's running faster it's got a nice little coffee smell just started phoning up let you know the good news.”
Oh my god, she's a very funny woman.
Not intentionally.
I'll give you an example.
I was due to do a gig in Barton-upon-Humber after two weeks before I'm due to do the gig.
I got a phone call from my agent said to me, Ramesh a little bit of an awkward situation.
The venue has been contacted by the BNP.
And they say that they're fundamentally opposed to you performing in Barton.
And if you go ahead with the performance, they're going to stage a protest the likes of which Barton has never seen..
Now I've got no idea what that means.
Are we going to dress up?
Is there going to be cake?
I've got idea..
My agent said to me “what you want to do?”
I said
“Well, the tour has not been selling that well.
This could be exactly the kind of PR that could give it a kick.
Is there any way you could organise sort of contact with some other racist organisations to get them to unify and get us into the Nationals… Do you know what I mean?
She says to me
“No, that's not what I meant.
What I meant was, do you want to pull the show?”
I said
“No, absolutely not. Because I thought this could be my big break.”
You know if they do a big protest, suddenly I'm a race warrior.
I'm a hero. I'm in all the papers. That's what I wanted, right.
They had to put plainclothes police officers in the audience, in case anything kicked off, right.
So that's five tickets.
I'm not gonna give you freebies.
It's not my fault you got f*cking BNP activity mate.. Control it.
Anyway, we turn up there.
Pull into the carpark
No protest.
And in many ways that is the ultimate protest, isn't it?
"We hate you so much that we cannot be asked to turn up and tell you how much we hate you."
I was still nervous though because I thought sh*t, you know,
They said it's a protest the likes of which "Barton has never seen"
Could happen at any point. I could be in the toilet. Might get me there..
One of them comes out the bowls..
You know, take that you brown b*stard
Like I fist up the *sshole
I don't know
Could be surprised attack, sneak attack.
So I'm still nervous..
We get into the venue.
The staff in the venue been very apologetic, sort of overcompensating and being very nice.
Did me a curry (which is a bit of a pisstake)... bit raisins in it anyway it doesn't matter.
I do the show, nothing happens.
I finish the show, I phone up my wife because she's worried..
I said to her nothing happened.
She said to me, “You know what Rom, in many ways. You sort of got a hope that it was racism…”
And I said to her:
“What the f*ck you talking about?”
She said to me:
“Well imagine if it wasn’t that it would be much worse.
Imagine if the BNP contacted the venue and said hello this the BNP were fundamentally opposed to Ramesh performing in Barton.
And they said well, we don't tolerate racism.
And I said no it's not racism...
We just think he's dogshit.
Imagine as an ethnic minority act, if your ethnicity wasn't what the BNP found most offensive.