July 2024

The first ever Community Quilt that I contributed to has been put together and is currently part of multiple Quilting Bee’s across the USA where groups of masked Queer people are sharing their skills for a shared cause. It makes me so proud to see pictures on instagram of people working on this together, so many Queer voices have contributed to the Euphoria Quilt through our quilt blocks and more have come together to actually hand quilt and add stitches. It made me emotional and proud seeing everyone masked in the photos from the Quilting Bee. The quilt measure 11 foot by 12 foot and is made from 166 blocks by 166 different individuals! How epic! Check out the instagram HERE

Photo credit goes to: Nicholas Valdés

We recently visited the local park and checked out the lovely conservatory which has been reopened. It originally opened in 1934 with a big chrysanthemum display which locals loved. Broomfield Park was opened to the public in 1903 when Southgate Urban District Council bought Broomfield House, the Stables and 54 acres of land. Friends of Broomfield Park website states “The land around Broomfield House has passed through a number of owners and it’s difficult to describe the history of the Broomfield “Estate” as distinct from Broomfield House and it’s immediate grounds.The owners that we can trace from the 1550’s begin with John Bromfylde, a, a leather merchant. In 1556 he sold ‘Bromehowse’ and its land to Geoffrey Walkenden. He was a Master of the Skinners’ Company and involved in the fur trade with Muscovy. Sir John Spencer then owned the estate from 1599. He was a Master of the Clothworkers’ Company, trading with the Ottoman Empire and the Levant. Lord Mayor in 1594-5, he was reputedly the richest man in England.”

Unfortunately in the 1980s there was a fire at Broomfield House, so I have never had the opportunity to go inside and see it. All my life it has been a derelict, structurally unsound building hidden away behind scaffolding and boarded up. Still we are lucky to have the ponds, the bandstand, fields, tennis courts, conservatory and playground to enjoy. Between 2011 and 2024 there have been numerous repairs made which alongside the current costs of heating are paid for by the council. The plants and upkeep is done by wonderful volunteers at Friends of Broomfield Park. I found these photographs my Grandpa took of me at the Conservatory in 1997 when I was 2.5 years old. You can see how lush and full it looks in there, unfortunately most of those plants died other than the Banana Plants you can see around the pond in the centre. I love seeing how Grandpa photographed me on our adventures, I miss him so much. 

I got the opportunity to illustrate some essays for SICK Magazine. “SICK is an independent, thoughtful magazine exploring illness and disability, founded & edited by Olivia Spring and designed by Kaiya Waerea. Founded in Norwich, UK in 2019, we are currently based in Maine, USA and London, UK. We typically publish one issue per year. SICK is committed to elevating the voices of sick & disabled people by publishing essays, features, poetry, visual art, interviews, and more. Our aim is to increase representation of sick & disabled people in publishing and the arts and to challenge the harmful stereotypes and misconceptions surrounding disability. We work in and with our slowness, pausing and resting when we need to. We believe, listen to, and support each other. We reject productivity as means of value and celebrate our sick & disabled bodies. Learn more about our work by reading interviews and reviews on our press page.”

It was an honour to get to read 5 essays from writers who are Disabled or have chronic illnesses. Obviously I am a visual artist, I express myself mostly through images and secondarily through words. So I appreciated the opportunity to read creative writing about their lives and conditions, and some of the metaphors peoples use to understand their own bodies and experiences. I am also proud of my About the Artist page, which is covered in my doodles, and on the page opposite they included one of my Free Palestine illustrations. Its so important to highlight that Palestinian Occupation and War on Palestine cause death and disability, as well as preventing already sick and disabled people from accessing medicine and treatment. If youre from the USA purchase your copy HERE and if youre from the UK or Rest of the world purchase your copy HERE.

We had a lovely visit to Kew Gardens as we do, but this time there was an exhibition there by Mark Quinn called Light into Life. The main artworks seen throughout Kew were large sculptures made of shiny reflective stainless steel, with a few others cast in bronze. It was really fun and exciting walking around the grounds looking for these sculptures to reveal themselves. I saw reveal themselves because even though we knew where they are on the map, the reflective nature of most of them meant they blended in, reflected and distorted the landscapes around them. Most were outside but there were two enlarged orchid sculptures inside the Temperate House, nestled amongst the lush leaves and plants. I also loved going back to the Waterlily House where I wore my beaded waterlily earrings as I looked at the two biggest waterlily varieties known in the world. The second biggest is the Victoria Amazonica found in Brazil and Guyana and the biggest which was cultivated and grown at Kew in 2022 called Victoria Boliviana. Black dye (non toxic) is put in the water so that you can see the contrast of the lilypads better, and to prevent algae growing. I dream of one day being able to see the Victoria Amazonica in Guyana in their natural habitat one day.

Text taken from the exhibition about the orchid sculptures inside Temperate House: 

Light into Life (The Release of Oxygen) 
Marc Quinn, 2023, Stainless steel

About the artwork

“This 1 m sculpture is modelled on a Phalaenopsis orchid. It's installed near another artwork modelled on a Sobralia orchid, from Kew's extensive collection. Both have been enlarged to a scale that inverts our experience of nature.Hidden amongst and reflecting the plants in the Temperate House, these unexpected objects encourage us to take a closer look at our environments, celebrating the greenery that we so often take for granted.

Reflections from Kew

'I enjoy the scale of this piece - it plays with our human experience, giving us a chance to imagine ourselves as insects.

As a horticulturist, I like to reflect on the plant-pollinator relationships of the collections in my care, many of which are fantastically complicated. Some orchids, for example, attract pollinators through imitation, luring would-be mates into their complex floral structures without giving the typical nectar reward.'

Jessy Challenger, botanical horticulturist”

Text taken from the exhibition about bonsai sculptures inside Temperate House:

Held by Desire (The Dimensions of Freedom) 2017-2018 and 2024

About the artwork

“Our relationship to our environment is often one of control: from gardening to farming, we tame nature to serve our needs and wants. The bonsai tree, in the form most know it, is maintained at a miniaturised scale through human intervention.

Quinn's sculptural versions, life-sized and enlarged, are based on the bonsai of Masahiko Kimura. The colossal sculptures imagine the trees freed from the bonds of human desire, enlarged to align with their own nature and potential.

Reflections from Kew

It's strange to see an object that in my experience requires constant care and maintenance reimagined as something static that needs no more work.

A living bonsai is a never-finished artwork that usuatly outlives its artist. Inheriting a tree is like being a rung on a ladder - there are often many rungs behind and hopefully many rungs ahead. I wonder how this sculpture will age and change in the future.' Richard Kernick, botanical horticulturist”

The sculptures which were scattered around Kew Gardens mostly related to how humans interact with and use plants for different reasons. I forgot to make not of the other plants which are used for medicine, food and fibres but below are quotes from Mark Quinn about some of these works. 

“We use palms daily for food, clothes, medicine, shelter...

When I think of palms, I think of tropical jungles, teeming and steaming with life, chaotic and disorderly. I feel that even in the controlled environment of the Palm House.

I wanted to convey this duality in my sculptures: the idea that the natural disorder of life on Earth simultaneously gives rise to the order that makes it habitable for humans.”

“After touring Kew's Palm House with Dr William Baker, Quinn was inspired to create three monumental artworks that celebrate the palm tree's spectacular sculptural form and striking silhouette.

The works represent our relationship with palms and their role in providing shelter, food and fabric for the survival of millions of people across the world. The mirroring reminds us of the role of light in the creation of plants and all living things, and blurs the boundaries between viewer, plant and landscape.”

On our way back to the car we passed the Shirley Sherwood Gallery which had more of Mark Quinn’s artwork relating to nature spanning from the 90s to 2023. I first heard of Mark Quinn in the early days of making art. I cant remember which teacher it was but we learnt about him due to his infamousy, breaking the boundaries of what art can be. In 1998 he cast a sculpture of his own head in his own blood. We saw a couple of those types of artworks on display here, a bouquet of flowers made from animal blood and a sculpture of his head but cast in coconut milk, both artworks displayed in refrigerated cases. There was also another artwork in a fridge called Eternal Spring (Cultural Evolution) which is the title of a series of works from 1998 to the present. 

Eternal Spring (Cultural Evolution)

“For his series Eternal Spring (1998-present), Quinn has frozen single bouquets of flowers at the moment of blooming in custom-built refrigeration units, using liquid silicone. The life cycle of a flower effectively ends when it is cut, but for as long as they remain frozen, the 'dead' flowers will not decay. Their transformation into art grants them an illusory immortality - a metaphor for the creation of art in general. The flowers become sculptures of themselves, composed of the same atoms as when they were still alive.

For the 2024 version, the freezer is a modified supermarket fridge, filled with two bouquets. This is a comment on the commodification of nature and the way in which market demand causes the proliferation of certain species over others, rendering reproduction as much the result of our shopping choices as it is biology.”

When I looked at this artwork I felt so grateful to love and understand the vastness that is art. DNA Garden, 2001 is a metal frame, with small winders filled with bacteria colonies from 75 plants and two humans. It makes me so happy and excited that art can be absolutely anything, because the way I approach art I would never in a million years have come up with something like that. I also really loved the historical illustrations in Kew’s collection exhibited alongside Quinn’s own illustrations and plant related drawings and plans from previous exhibitions. There were a few small hybrid plant sculptures which had the base of an orchid but was fused with fruit like cherries and pears, these were pretty whimsical and fun. 

Before visiting Guyana in September 2023 I drank 3-5 cups of tea a day, each with three sugars in them. I knew sugar is an inflammatory but I drinking milky, sugary tea was comforting to me and I didnt know how I was going to give it up. Ever since I came back from Guyana I have been making and drinking chai. Not really because its a Guyanese tradition, as Im not sure it is, but I enjoyed drinking it at the Authentic Indian restaurant owned by Suyash, who Gina met while doing her MA. He welcomed us so warmly, and after the trip I asked him for a chai recipe which Ive been making ever since. I love the ritual of making it, and the joy and satisfaction of sitting down and drinking it. 

When I saw that there was an exhibition called 茶, चाय, Tea (Cha, Chai, Tea) at the Horniman Museum and Gardens I knew I had to visit. I randomly checked my list of exhibitions I wanted to go to and realised there were only days left to go! My Mum saw that there was also a plant sale on so we all headed down to Forest Hill SE London. Below I have shared a mixture of my thoughts and text copied directly from the exhibition which will be in quotation marks. At the end of the day, I cant write or explain these histories better than the curators so I figured its best to just share their wise words. 

“The history of Britain’s favourite drink is far more complex, emotional and international than we might expect. From the origins of the Camellia sinensis plant and tea-drinking culture in China, to tea’s global spread and relationship to empire and identity, the 茶, चाय, Tea exhibition brings together a multitude of voices and stories into a compelling blend of personal, historic and artistic explorations of our daily cuppa.” - Navjot Mangat, Senior Curator of Social Practice

“Initially cultivated by the Bä and Shu peoples in southwest China, tea was kept and given as a medicinal herb. Tea was popularised in the Táng Dynasty (618-907), with the famed tea-guide Chajing (Classic of Tea) by scholar Lù Yu. Along with other poets and scholars of the Táng period, Lù Yu celebrated tea's health benefits but also highlighted how tea aligned with Buddhist ideas of meditation, Daoist notions of nature and Confucian ideals of universal balance. Holding great cultural value, tea became engrained in social customs, serving as a gift. an offering of thanks and an important part of family life.”

A really cool part of these exhibition were infographics, each one spaced around the exhibition and written but a different person with individual connections to tea. Many of the excerpts are from members of the Hackney Chinese Community Service, talking about family, tradition, diaspora. Theodora said “For me, tea is not just a drink, it is a moment for reflection and meditation. Time slows down, it's a totally different world to experience?”

There was an artwork which showed camels with packages of tea on there back, showing how tea was transported along the silk road: “Tea drinking and customs spread from China across the nations and peoples of Asia and the Middle East as early as the Tang dynasty (618-907), along the Silk Road trading routes. Traders used camels to transport tea, compressed into bricks. The route stretched from Xiăn (then Chang'an) north-central China all the way to modern Istanbul, Turkey. Eastern trade routes took tea to Korea and Japan.”

“How  did tea from China become Britain's national drink? 

In 1664 the East India Company placed its first order of 100 lbs of Chinese tea from the Dutch East India Company controlled port city of Java, Indonesia. By 1764, the East India Company was importing, on average, 5.6 million Ibs of tea to Britain annually, and this rose to 23 million lbs by 1800. By the end of the 19th century, historians estimate that the average Briton consumed over a thousand cups of tea a year. Tea in Britain underwent a metamorphosis, from an exoticised curiosity for a few, to a staple in every home. Easy to brew, energising and as sweet or as strong as the drinker desired, tea was widely adopted. Culturally, tea became attached to British values and rituals, leading to the birth of British tea culture.”

I was drawn towards an etched print from 1808 by Thomas Sutherland and Robert John Thornton, titled Gathering of Tea. “Created at a time when foreigners were not allowed into mainland China, the knowledge that informed these etchings would have come from Hang merchants in Guăngzhou (then Canton). Their information was critical to the sale and marketing of tea. Although fairly accurate, British botanists and merchants often treated the information with suspicion. Amidst this, the East India Company sought to illegally infiltrate mainland China to steal tea, learn tea processing techniques to propagate tea plants in India.” What many people dont understand about colonialism is the pure greed, racism and thievery that was involved. Instead of trading, the British empire chose force and nefarious actions in order to take over the trade, as well as pumping Opium into the country to destabilise them in numerous ways. They stole knowledge from other countries (in this case China), then went to other parts of their empire (in this case India) and changed the landscape there to grow not only tea but also opium. In fact, the regions where my and many other Indian Indentured ancestors come from (Uttar Pradesh and Bihar) were forced to grow this crop, many becoming addicted themselves and no longer producing crops native to their land. It was an exploitative system which you can read more about in this article How Britain's Opium Trade Impoverished Indians.

“What was the true cost of tea? For tea, Britain fought wars, colonised lands, exploited, poisoned and displaced peoples in their hundreds of thousands. In Britain, racism and Sinophobia (anti-Chinese sentiment) were actively employed to justify the nation's conflicts and colonial expansion. By 1839, the illegal sale of opium paid for a majority of Britain's trade with China. As addiction spread across the nation, the Qing Empire demanded that Britain stopped the sale of the harmful drug. Faced with this dilemma, and in the name of 'free trade and tea, Britain chose to wage war. The violence enacted for tea, and its profit, forever changed the world we live in. From the colonisation of Hong Kong to the introduction of tea estates and plantations in South Asia and East Africa, the legacies of this history remain relevant today.”

“In 1839 the Dàoguãng Emperor appointed Governor General Lín Zéxú as commissioner in charge of ending opium smuggling. Lín Zéxú disposed of 1.2 million kilograms of opium, arrested thousands of dealers and smugglers and destroyed paraphernalia, like these pipes. Britain's response to his campaign, and its economic implications, was to wage war.”

Here is an excerpt from a letter to Queen Victoria from Commissioner Lín Zéxú in 1839 which highlights simply the colonial violence and hypocrisy inflicted by the british empire: 

“...Your foreign ships come hither...for our trade, and for the simple reason of their strong desire to reap a profit...By what principle of reason then, should these foreigners send in return a poisonous drug, which involves in destruction those very natives of China?'

'We have heard that in your own country opium is prohibited with the utmost strictness and severity: this is a strong proof that you know full well how hurtful it is to mankind.

'Let us suppose that foreigners came from another country, and brought opium into England, and seduced the people of your country to smoke it, would not you, the sovereign of the said country, look upon such a procedure with anger, and in your just indignation endeavor to get rid of it?'

...Month by month, and year by year, the volume of the poison increases, its unclean stench ascends upwards, until heaven itself grows angry, and the very gods thereat get indignant!'

'Has China (we should like to ask) ever yet sent forth a noxious article from its soil?

Not to speak of our tea and rhubarb, things which your foreign countries could not exist a single day without...”

“Horniman's Tea Company, founded in 1826 by John Horniman, was the first to sell tea in mechanically sealed packages. They celebrated

'Horniman's Pure Tea' as 'untouched' by traders who might bulk up tea with twigs and dust. Later they proclaimed it free from colouring, sometimes added by Chinese merchants to meet European consumer expectations.

John's son, Frederick Horniman, took over the business in 1868. Two decades later it was the largest tea trading business in the world. With the wealth gained from tea, Frederick founded the Horniman Museum in 1890.

As tea's popularity rose, tea merchants made a concerted effort to root the drink in 'Englishness'. Mainly aimed at women, companies marketed tea as an important part of English domestic life as well as a tool for social mobility. Posters and marketing images for tea often centred women from upper-class backgrounds enjoying tea, or in a home-maker role, buying tea for their families. 

Horniman's Pure Tea offered incentives and coupons for homewares, clothing, silverware that the ideal English home 'needed'. Collectible stickers for children reinforced the notion that tea was for the whole family. Asian peoples were often erased entirely or othered. When featured, Asians were exoticised, typically shown picking tea in idyllic fields or serving tea.”

“The Opium Wars (1839-1860) led to a stark shift in how Chinese people were depicted and presented in Britain, in contrast to the orientalist fashion of the 17th and 18th centuries.

Racist stereotypes were created and promoted to justify violence and colonial expansion in the name of 'free trade'.

Racism permeates all levels of society. Here we see how Sinophobia (anti-Chinese sentiment) was spread through Britain, from children's toys, to tea caddies and tea marketing. The harmful characterisations of Chinese peoples during this period still play a role in Sinophobia, prejudices and racism against East and South East Asian communities today.”

“Tea Wars: the Opium Wars (1839-1842, 1856-1860)

China fought and lost against Britain and its European allies in two Opium Wars, trying to stop the illegal trade of opium and keep European powers in check. Britain, however, fought to gain greater power over trade in China. The Treaty of Nanking (1842) ceded the island of Hong Kong to the British, ended the single-port system of trade and fined the Qing empire for destroyed opium, debts and damages incurred. The Convention of Peking (1860) gave further territory to European powers and forced ten more ports to open. Free movement for Europeans was established and the import of opium was legalised. In 1997, Hong Kong was 'returned' to China. In February 2023, the UK government reported that over 140,000 Hongkongers had settled in the UK following the implementation of the national security law (2020) in the city.”

“I  am the sugar at the bottom of the English cup of tea.'-  Stuart Hall. As a response to Stuart Hall's essay Old and New Identities, Old and New Ethnicities, Richard Mark Rawlins work shows a Black fist rising from a quintessentially British tea cup, made in China and shipped to Britain via Amazon. It recalls the sheer number of people of colour that shaped the British Empire and enabled British culture today. Until 1838 sugar in Britain was a product of the labour of enslaved African peoples in the Caribbean. Later, plantation owners exploited indentured labourers to continue production.The rituals and customs that paired sugar with tea, as well as sweet cakes and pastries eaten at high or afternoon tea, sustained demand for sugar amongst British consumers.”

“By the late 19th century, Indian tea was traded across Britain. It was marketed as 'superior' tea from British soil, backed by racialised pseudoscience to undermine Chinese tea. In India, tea started becoming popular in the 1930s. Faced with economic downturn and a high tea yield, a concerted effort was made to market the drink to Indian people. Tea dust was a cheap and popular product. The lower grade tea, a by-product of loose tea production, provided strong flavour that could be accompanied with milk and spices to create the flavours and aromas that we recognise today as Chai.”

“The  Chargola Exodus of 1921

In spring 1921 around 30,000 tea workers started a mass walkout from plantations in Chargola Valley, Assam to make their way home. This was a protest against the indentured labour system, with harsh working conditions, and wages so low that workers and their families were dying of hunger. By May, part of the group made it to Chandpur train station (today in Chittagong, Bangladesh). There, the Assamese colonial police opened fire on them. Many were killed, with their bodies thrown into nearby rivers. The incident sparked outrage and further fuelled a call for an independent India. This poem, published in Amrita Bazar Patrika June 17, 1921, tells the story from a worker's perspective:

The 'Englishman' may have his say

That we're there very happy and gay, 

But starved we were from day to day, 

And God knows how like dogs we stayed.

Our daughter's izzat (honour) was not safe,

Small fine was all in case of rape

In midst of julum (oppression) we did chafe 

Like a bird in cage whose wings are clipped.

At Chandpur tho we stranded be,

Still have joy as we are free

From planter's clutches, tooth and claw 

And their big rapacious maw.

Shout 'Gandhi's jai! (Victory)' and cheer up all, 

March on, brothers, with Freedom's call.”

Overall I felt a real sense of honour and appreciation to see this exhibition and learn more about the british empire history. As a descendent of colonised people, I do feel connected to others around the world who were exploited by colonial powers, especially those who laboured on plantations as my Indian ancestors did in Guyana. The face of the world as we knew it changed because of colonialism. When you read more about my artwork Reap What You Sew below you will understand that the British colonial history of sugar is part of my family history. The image of britain on a global scale is often whitewashed with afternoon tea, cakes etc, but the history is not sweet, it is violent and bitter. The labour of colonised people, the resources and knowledge we cultivated was stolen from us in such violent, racist and greedy ways. We as people, and produce were shipped around the world for european colonial powers, to gain riches.

Although the exhibition is over I hope you have enjoyed reading about 茶, चाय, Tea (Cha, Chai, Tea) and have learnt more about cultures and traditions as well as the colonial history which isnt well known in britain.

The exhibition has been developed in partnership with organisations including:

•     Bollo Brook Youth Centre in Ealing
•     The British Asian Collective
•     Cuppo Bubbo in Herne Hill
•     Hackney Chinese Community Services
•     THIRST (The International Roundtable for Sustainable Tea)
•     Grass People Tree
•     Matheson Bosanquet Tea Estate

As well as a host of artists, academics and consultants.

While writing about my first time visiting the Horniman Museum and Gardens I realised that I never shared this artwork I made as a submission for a commission there. So its nice to share something which took a lot of energy and research to create which is very close to my heart. 

I designed this piece Reap What You Sew in response to a brief set by the Horniman Museum and Gardens, in Forest Hill, SE London, which I had submitted to. 

The Museum is named after Frederick Horniman, who inherited his dads business Horniman Tea founded in 1826. The Museum opened by a different name in 1890 but reopened in 1901 as a purpose built museum. The collection is full of tea and coffee paraphernalia formed throughout the british empire. Unfortunately I didnt get the opportunity so the detailed complex work stayed in my ipad until I remembered it in 2022. I had it printed on to a tea towel as I thought this was the most appropriate outcome for such an illustration. I share below the writing I submitted about how archives, galleries, objects and empire combine. 

As a descendant of colonised people living in England with an interest in the Victorian era of innovation, collecting and exploring, i see the privilege that those people of wealth enjoyed while colonised people across the globe were worked to death. I wish i could travel, return to my mothers country of birth and collect amazing textile art from different places while i make art and learn about history. Instead I feel it is my duty to make art which decolonises our institutions and brings our stories to the forefront of them. There is a conflict which many of us face living in the UK, while our government prevents institutions and schools from having these important conversations about our shared history. Colonised people know the history of the British empire but most of the general public have purposely not been taught about it.

While Europeans were dictating that colonised people were savages in need of civilising, they were also stealing our scientific and technological knowledge which advanced their society. 

This drawing encompasses my interest in Victorian life, needlework, collecting art and objects and the invention of greenhouses/wardian cases to preserve the natural history specimens being imported from across the globe. 

The woman sits at home doing needlework, her back facing away from some of the hard truths displayed behind her. The labour, control, violence which was involved in creating all the components of her content “British” life including afternoon tea. Her dress showcases the history of empire. Global travel on ships, sugarcane and tea plants worked by enslaved and displaced people, the cutlass used for the hard labour involved in cutting cane, the creation of West India docks on the Thames which became the global tea exporter of the time. Textiles, tea and sugar were three of the major exports which made Britain rich, by plundering the textiles industry in India, enslaving African people for labour and spinning cotton picked by them in many British mills or pumping Opium to and stealing tea seeds from China and forcing them to trade. 

The oil rig, flames outside the window and melting icebergs under her dress all reference the environmental issues which really started with colonialism and the onset of capitalism which contributes massively to our planets decline.  

Our government are currently try to stop the important works surrounding decolonisation, which I believe is integral to the future of our country. The true history of Britain needs to be acknowledged and reflected across all institutions because the legacies of colonialism are seen everywhere within them, and to this day ex-colonies suffer from poverty and corruption caused by Britain and Imperialism. 

As a mixed race person I can see the disparity within my own lineages as far as accessing family information. I know my paternal family history because they had the privilege of time, education, wealth and travel which allowed them to explore their family history. My maternal family came from the poorest communities of India to work as labourers in the Caribbean, their history is oral and comes with so much trauma that much of it is left unsaid. They never had access to education and when they did it was under colonial rule which forced them to assimilate and see the mother country in glory. While beginning the journey of trying to find more information about my Maternal family history as Indentured labourers I soon realised how difficult it would be to access. The land owners, ship captains and people of note where categorised and labelled within Kew Archives, which means if your ancestor were involved in the Slave Trade you could easily trace your family history. Whereas colonised people must spend weeks searching through records. 

My mum was born in Demerara, Guyana, an ex-british colony which was home to the first Indian Indentured labourers who worked the sugarcane plantations after The Slave Trade was abolished. Britain like to paint themselves as historically moral for abolishing the slave trade, but i personally know that they found cheap labour in India and other colonies, otherwise my family wouldn't have ended up in the South American country of Guyana on the Caribbean sea. 

Despite being the origin of Demerara sugar, my country Guyana is not known on a global scale. When I learnt that the western invention of anaesthesia has origins with the Indigenous Guyanese people who use blow darts for hunting I was shocked. Or that John Edmonstone, an ex Enslaved African man from Demerara, Guyana taught Charles Darwin how to do taxidermy in the Amazon rainforest, which is thought to have lead to him being able to prove his theory of evolution. How many more scientific discoveries have roots in Indigenous knowledge from across the globe? 

Britain became rich through textiles and trading many different goods which they stole or used slave labour to cultivate and spread across the world. This included tea and sugar, close to both my heart and the rest of the countries as well as the core of the Horniman’s collection. Without the Victorian obsession with tea and cakes, sugar wouldn't have been worth the same as gold.

Same as last year, we bought tickets for Father’s Day to see the Giants Live Strongman Classic 2024 at Royal Albert Hall, but this time our cousin Dan came with us as he loves sports. It was so fun seeing how impressed and blown away he was by the athletes and their achievements!! We witnessed 3 World Records, and another tied World Record. Pavlo Kordiyaka - Conan’s Wheel WR. He beat his own record with a 1009 degree rotation. Mitch Hooper - 218kg Axle Press WR, 267kg Wrecking Ball Hold for 118.72 seconds WR and then tied the Axle Deadlift with 8 reps. There was Kane Francis who just won England’s Strongest Man so it was cool to see him and Andrew Flynn having fun and representing England. The Singing Strongman Eddie Williams blessed us with another song, this time he also played guitar. I was so excited to see Gavin Bilton for the first time in person, he just looks like a classic Strongman and won UK’s Strongest Man in 2020 and 2021. Also getting the chance to see hardcore Oleksii Novikov who won Worlds Strongest Man in 2020. Pavlo was so impressive, at one point he almost passed out while attempting a 195kg Axle Press, I got so nervous as he came back out to try again and not only did he achieve it he also kept holding it above his head while standing on one leg. Tom Stoltman is my favourite, I always love seeing him push himself. You can see how much more comfortable and confident he is with 3 Worlds Strongest Man wins under his belt. Mitchell the young but already legendary and varied athlete came first, Tom was second and Pavlo came third. 

I loved going back to the Royal Albert Hall for the Strongman Class but I think it will be our last time going, just because it is actually so exhausting sitting and clapping for almost 5 hours but it was so fun and epic to watch and Im so glad we got to experience that with Dan. Its truly incredible seeing people who train so hard, do these massive feats of strength in front of a passionate and supportive crowd.