Ismat Ullah's expression of polite amiability is oddly out of sync with the fury of his words. In the 20 years he has spent as a Pakistani immigrant in Britain, slurs and rejections have engendered an abiding bitterness. But the mask remains in place. "I keep it all inside," he explains. "I listen to the jokes about Indians and Pakistanis, and I laugh so as not to show my weakness. But I resent it. As a colored person here, you have to be different from what you are. You have to keep a cosmetic appearance."
The cost of keeping up that appearance...
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