Tollgate Cafe

There was a short period of time, after I had dropped out of university in Cape Town and moved to London to live with my now husband but before I landed a decent-ish media job-with-a-future, where I worked in a little cafe, called the Tollgate Cafe. It was owned and managed by an Iranian, the head chef was Moroccan, the kitchen hand Korean, and my fellow waitress was Polish. I was the only person there whose first language was English. The Korean was a nice guy who had worked with the previous owner for years before she sold it on. But the Iranian was rude and abrupt and had no idea about how to run a cafe. They would get very angry at each other and shout in broken, frustrated English until they gave up trying and slunk away to opposite corners. The Korean worked from 6 in the morning to 6 at night every day, 7 days a week. He pretty much did all of the work while the Moroccan talked and smoked. The Moroccan made snide comments about the Korean, which did not go unheard and there were similar useless, feeble outbursts. One time I thought the Korean was going to kill the Moroccan, a timid man when not thoroughly provoked, he was all the more terrifying when his eyes blazed and his face turned crimson with 40 years of rage simmering in his gut. I asked him why he worked so hard and through much struggling of his foreign tongue said his family were poor and had no work, and what he earned in this trifling cafe paid for them to live and go to school and wear shoes in Korea. The Moroccan wore pointy boots, he had very small feet and hands, like a woman's. In fact he was small in general, like his growth was stunted at 14. I thought that is why he was an asshole to everyone. His lips curled when he spoke, like a sneer disguised as a smile. There was an element of something predatory and sexual about him that made me wince outright, but he was basically a lonely, bitter and weak old man. The Iranian, on the other hand, was terrifying. I never wanted to be left on my own with him, he had a murderous look. When he spoke he stood very close, so close you could smell his awful body and breath. He did this to intimidate others, it was effective. He mumbled when he spoke, as if he was too lazy to articulate the cobbled together sentences, and when you didn't understand he refused to repeat himself. He always looked tired and would gesture desultorily at customers confused by his behaviour and mumbled words. The Polish girl was very sweet. She was round and pink with big blue eyes like a doll, and a fiendish smoking habit. She swore under her breath a lot at the Iranian. She always helped me. This was a very queer time for me. One of those times that have a sound and a smell. Even though I only worked for four hours some days it felt exhausting, I hated the work and I hated the interlopers I worked amongst with whom I could barely communicate. I felt like I was a long way from home and alone. When I feel useless now I think of how much space I've put between me and then and I feel slightly better.