Getting to Know You: Dr Zubir Ahmed

What’s your earliest memory?

It’s my grandad taking me for a walk in Govanhill Park in the southside of Glasgow. He was a policeman in Hong Kong in the 1930s and he was a giant of a man. He still had that stature and pace of walking that he had when he was younger man.

What was your relationship with him?

Very warm. He lived with us. I was the firstborn in an old-school extended Asian family with my mum, dad, aunt, uncle, grandad and grandma. I was pretty spoiled when I was young, to be honest.  

My dad worked very hard as a taxi driver in those years, so I spent a lot of time with my grandad from about three until nine or 10. He was the one picking me up from school, taking me to evening mosque classes, telling me about the stories of Hong Kong and how proud he was of his 20 years spent there as a policeman, stories of the Second World War, and of partition when Pakistan and India split. 

He was fluent in Cantonese, and I remember him a few times at the library in Govanhill meeting a Chinese lady, speaking the language with her, and being in awe of him doing that.

What were you like at school? 

I was pretty shy. I started school with a very rudimentary English vocabulary because we spoke Punjabi Urdu in the house. So, in the first couple of years of school, I’m not sure I knew what was going on most of the time, to be honest, and I suspect that just fed a shyness into my character which probably continued for most of my school life. I didn’t really come out of my shell until university.  

I went to a school where most folk weren’t from my background, both socio-economically and ethnically. I was the only person of colour in my class as I recall, in primary school certainly.  

I then went to secondary school on a scholarship and so I interacted with people that I would never have met in any other walk of life. I felt like a little bit of an outsider in that sense. But I made some very good friends in secondary school that have lasted until the current day. 

How did you build your confidence?

When I went to university I finally realised I was good at some stuff.

There was a very competitive, charged environment in my school. So, although I was probably in the top 10 per cent in terms of academic achievement, you never felt that sense of where you were on that spectrum. 

At university, you got that feeling you were doing something you were enjoying and doing it with friends that were like-minded. 

What’s the worst thing that anyone’s ever said to you? 

There are things that were said to me as a child growing up in Govanhill, which are probably not publishable because of the racist and graphic content, that was the kind of place I grew up. And as much as I would like to say that words don’t hurt, that would be wrong. The fact that I am thinking about them 37, 38 years later means they probably have had some impact on how I view the world and how that’s shaped me. 

We suffered a lot of racial abuse in those years in Govanhill; we were one of the only Asian families there. I don’t actually think that it was meant to be malicious in the sense that there was intrinsic hatred of colour, I think it was because it was a discriminating feature of us as a family versus them. 

There were some horrible things said, so much so that my mum never used to let us go out and play in that park that my grandad and I walked through because things deteriorated so badly in those years.  

I actually took my kids back a few months ago to show them where I grew up and I thought ‘when I was their age I couldn’t go into this park’. Thankfully things have changed for the better in some ways. 

Another thing I remember is someone telling me at school that I wasn’t very good with my hands, and that really upset me. Maybe that’s why I became a surgeon: to prove them wrong. 

What’s your most treasured possession?

I have a little cardboard box filled with letters and cards that patients have sent me over the years to say thank you for things I have been a part of that have maybe saved their lives or made their lives better. There are some from patients’ relatives where I felt I’ve failed but they’re still very grateful for me trying. 

As I am talking, I can picture some of these cases in front of me very vividly, some that happened 10 to 15 years ago, they suddenly come back. It’s said that every surgeon has a graveyard in their mind of complications that they often go to visit and pay homage to, think about and reflect on. That’s very true for me. And when I’m not feeling myself, wondering who I am and what my identity is, I open that box and remind myself.  

What skill should every person have?

Some sort of practical skill. I think whatever you do in your life you should have some sort of trade or a hinterland that’s rooted in some kind of practicality, whether that’s working with your hands or skill that you can give back to society. 

I think politics is a wonderful and noble endeavour, but I feel most people should come to politics with something rather than see it as a career. I am understanding more and more as I walk through the corridors of Westminster that politics is an art, and perhaps a profession in its own right. 

But I think you do yourself and the people you serve a disservice if that’s the only thing you bring to the table. You’ve got to have some other practical skillset. 

What was your best holiday ever?

We didn’t do this very often in my youth because we couldn’t afford it, but every three or four years we’d go back to Pakistan. The reason I loved it was because we had so much extended family there. Although we met very occasionally, there was a depth of feeling and love among us that was familiar, as if you hadn’t been away from each other for more than a couple of weeks.