I was scared of the dark as a child, so my bedroom door was always left open. I could not only hear my dad getting ready at 5am each day, I could smell him and his Old Spice aftershave. I would get a glimpse of him through the door, and he would look immaculate: ironed trousers, pristine ironed shirt, shiny shoes – and he was going to drive the buses. He was a bus driver for nearly 40 years. He took so much pride in his work and did so much overtime. He had a real dedication and respect for the job. His work discipline rubbed off on me, I think.
My elder brother, Muneeb, set the standard as I was growing up – I realised there was nothing I could do that was ever going to supersede what he could do, academically. That is what taught me to be more creative. I thought, OK, I’ll do something completely different. So on my 10th birthday, I announced that I wanted to be a radio presenter.
My dad was from a traditional rural background in Pakistan and, by his own admission, didn’t have a great education. He always told me I was lucky to have a chance to have an education. My mum would, too. She always said she didn’t care what I ended up doing as long as I got myself a university degree. So the day I graduated, I gave her my certificate and said, “There you go, that’s your degree. Now I’m going off to do my radio.” And she said, “Fine, go for it.”
Every New Year, we’d go to a party at my uncle’s. From the age of 11, I would stand up and do silly little magic tricks with my brother, and then comedic impressions of Prince Charles and other characters, including my relatives. It became a tradition. Mostly, it went down quite well – except with my aunt. She had this catchphrase in Punjabi, which translates as something like: “Oooh, that’s another problem we’ve got.” I’d just stand there, saying her catchphrase, and everyone would recognise it and laugh. I’d also do my uncle – he had this weird throat-noise, which I now use as Mr Khan – but I would do it from the other side of the room, in case he threw something at me.
I remember being called Paki for the first time as a kid at school. The next morning, my mum was putting Brylcreem in my brother’s hair and mine, which she did every morning, God knows why – and I was really quiet. She asked me what was wrong, and I told her and said, I don’t want to go to school. She said, “You can’t let somebody like that stop you going to school. Paki is just short for Pakistani and that’s who you are. It’s just a name; it only offends you if you allow it to. Next time he calls you that, you call him an Engli.” So I did – and the whole class started laughing. It was a brilliant moment. And no one ever called me a Paki again.
Every Saturday night, we would watch Dallas as a family. My grandmother would sit sewing, and occasionally have a go at us for watching it. She wanted us to talk to each other instead. But we would watch it anyway. At the end of the series, we realised that she had sewn cushions that were identical to those on the sofa in the Southfork ranch.
My parents split up when I was 11. I couldn’t get my head around why they would do that. It made me very independent, suddenly. I realised I couldn’t rely on my parents … and that if they were not always going to be together, maybe I would be on my own one day. They lived in the same house for six years after they separated. Dad lived in the front and Mum lived in the back. It was awkward. I was always being caught between the two of them, trying to work out who to sit with that day, because they had separate living rooms. And we’d all eat separately.
One of the reasons I haven’t committed myself to marriage is because I somehow think I’ve got to make it perfect. I’ve got to prove that you can have a perfect family. I have to constantly remind myself that that is ludicrous.
