I should have known better. From the moment I saw these girls I was amazed and bowled over that they were so lovely. I had found the best friends of my life within the first few days or even hours of college. I felt like my choice to go to such a far away college, so different to my school and the reputable sixth forms my teachers were pushing me to go to and more importantly that most others from my high school were going to, was brilliant. Sure I was unsure- the transistion was too easy, the work too unstructured and the atmosphere too informal. Yet in terms of friends I thought I had gotten it right.

From the moment I was introduced to the group I became one of them, instanteously privy to the in-jokes, behaviours and opinions. They came from a different home environment from my westernised one, an ethnic area which was reflected in their schools as opposed to my largely white, with black, filipeno and more rarely mixed race year group and similar area miles closer to central London than their far western suburbs. They were of different religions- I had previously spent 12 years in schools strictly faith-based and selectional. I was naiive, ignorant because it was different studying their religions at school but I was too happily closeted in my world of carefully chosen schools which in turn carefully chose their pupils. I didn’t have a friend of a different faith, or indeed a neighbour of that matter as I grew up for many years in a renowned burgeouis area, downgrading before my teenage years to a social hotpot of an area, again close to the city and currently undergoing gentrification. I had so much to learn from them about their native country- along the way gaining invaluable insight into their British-Asian identity- their language and cultures.

Very early on I saw first hand the banter between the two main asian nationalities in the college and indeed in the local area the majority of the college lived in. During that first year friendship groups ran in the same vein as the nationalities more or less. This left my friendship group uninhibited to declare their dislike for other girls as they belonged to the other nationality. I was confused and asked outright if they hated each other. Some said no. Others laughed. She who shan’t be named, with all her emphasis on fair skin, also had a way with double edged jokes, often quite personal and resulting in several girls having complexes. She was quick to brand Bubble similar in appearance to the girls of the other nationality. In turn She who shan’t be named hated, with a passion, a girl of the other nationality. When quizzed on the subject she sometimes answered that it was the nationality of the other girl.

Oh and a rumour I heard around the time She who shan’t be named had her frosty attack on my closest friend, was that her previous boyfriend -oh yes miss purity had been around- whom she laughed about with the other girls, was cheated on by She who shan’t be named. She had then dumped her boyfriend before racially abusing him. This came from a close friend of both parties involved. If I had heard the story a year previously I would have never believed it. This girl was the master of disguise.

How could I forget that when I first became a part of the group there were 4 integral members who had come together during the days before I had met them. There was another girl, very quiet doormouse like and not very social or seemingly group orientated. Wenty, a genuinely but often endearingly immature and naive girl, was friends with Tomboy, a girl whom the others had always disliked and from the sounds of it this dislike was deep rooted from high school days. Wenty was often jeered at for her friendship with tomboy, but continued abashed somewhat. Tomboy was ignored, laughed at to her face and behind her back. But interestingly 3 months later she was a fully fledged member of the group. This unashamedly fickle nature of the group should have alerted me. Instead I too warmed to Tomboy, whilst holding back my reservations about her nature passing it off as mere personality differences. The rest of the group however were fully converted. Warts and all. N.B. Tomboy appears to have been a main perpetrator in the post event gossiping, isolating me from others.

Another. Initially we all saw through her. She was flirtatious, proud, egotistical. She was clingy and annoying. But one by one they warmed to her. Or rather Wenty warmed to her. She who shan’t be named didn’t see her as a threat. Bubbles slowly, trepidly warmed to her. My closest friend held a balanced view but together we realised she was lonely without friends as I could have been, and we were polite and friendly until we began to fall for the charm. My opinion of this girl has been tinged by the whole saga and I believe her to be easily led and eager to please the others. My point here is really just how fickle and two faced the group was- the group at the time was me, so I accept my own judgement of myself.