Tina Daheley wrote a letter to an unnamed restaurant and published it on Twitter on Wednesday. She wrote the letter after hearing a racist slur in the restaurant and wanted the restaurant authorities to take action against it.
In the two-page letter, she explained the details of the incidents: ‘I’m writing this letter to the restaurant where all this shit happened. I was feeling guilty for my silence on that day. I wished to handle the things differently, but sleep deprivation on stopped me.’
‘A middle-aged, man was sitting there and was using a vulgar and offensive racist word.
He used the word starting with the letter ‘P’ when he was discussing cricketer Azeem Rafiq’s recent testimony. He might be doing it to provoke me or perhaps he was in a bad mood after sitting next to two women of color ’, she said.
Azeem Rafiq talked about the racism he experienced within the sport and that men criticized him for using disgusting words throughout the word. The wife of the man was saying him to close the discussion after watching us, but he went on speaking continuously.
Tina Daheley admitted that she wanted to confront them, but was so upset at that time. The letter described the complete incident as: ‘Dear, I’m writing this letter to inform you about an incident that took place in [—–] on the evening of Friday, November 5.’
‘We had a dinner reservation at the restaurant for two at 7 pm. As we arrived there, we saw a table sitting beside us. They were two white, middle-aged couples. The news channel was highlighting a dominating story of the racism experienced by Azeem Rafiq on the England cricket team. The couples started discussing the news headlines broadcasting at that time.’
The second page stated: ‘The man sitting directly to my left became aggressive and started using an extremely offensive word starting with the letter P. Everyone else sitting on that table entitled to their own opinions, but the use of such hateful and racist words is unacceptable.
Her wife noticed how shocked we are and she forced her husband to stop repeating that word, but he did not pay any attention to her words.’
‘I don’t know what thing provoked him to do such shit in a public place. Perhaps he wanted me to react as I’m a journalist, perhaps he didn’t consider our presence or, perhaps he was unhappy while sitting next to two women of color.
I thought about it a lot and finally, I decided to bring it to your attention. I’m feeling powerless to do anything so I want you to take action.’
Tina Daheley concluded: ‘I know everyone has a right to discuss the issues of the place where they lived, but in 2021 there is no place for this kind of language. The incident affected my mental health as I kept thinking about it for weeks. I was so upset at that time that my feet did not support me to stand up and confront them.’
One of their followers of Tina sent her a message: ‘We’re proud of you for speaking up, no matter what time has passed.’
Another added: ‘I’m feeling sorry that it happens to you, but you take a big step towards it. You worked on it by yourself and then took a sensible approach at the end. Such acts are unacceptable in any society and it is compulsory to discourage them.’
Azeem broke down into tears when he spoke to MPs last month about the racial discrimination against Tim Bresnan, Matthew Hoggard, Alex Hales, David Lloyd, and Gary Balance. He also apologized for using anti-semitic slurs in a series of messages to a fellow cricketer during his time at Yorkshire CCC.
He also claimed that older players on his local team forced him to drink red wine at the age of 15. They wanted me to be addicted to it and tried to ruin my religious limits. The coaches also gave him inhumane treatment after his wife had a miscarriage in 2017.
The spin bowler said that he is not the only one who suffered through this racism. He claimed that hundreds and thousands of cricketers will now open up with their racism claims. He also said that in his early days at Yorkshire, the older players used to call the Asian players elephant washers.
