Becky, a 27-year-old accountant, shares her story of growing up around illegal tobacco.
My earliest memories involve sitting in my grandparents living room completely cloaked in smoke. Thick clouds would engulf me and my cousins. As kids, we would pretend to swim in it, and we would even incorporate it into dance routines. We would ask our uncles to blow plumes of smoke to recreate the ‘Stars in Your Eyes’ reveal. For anyone born after 2000, this reference is an anti-smoker’s vision of hell. I know that the 90’s should be taken with a pinch of salt, but these memories of smoke horrify me. Before I get on my soap box, let me give you some background.
My name is Becky, and I have lived in South Wales for most of my life. I am very close to my family but growing up was not always easy. The police were constant visitors, and my family was no stranger to crime. For the eye-rollers out there, this was my reality as a child, and is one that is similar for many. However, before you get the violin out: my family were very loving.
So, what is my experience of the illicit market? Well, my family were avid buyers. If there was cheap tobacco going, my family would buy it in spades. On my estate, cheap cigs could be found in car boots, homes, and in local parks. Foreign packets and singles were littered throughout my house. Cheap cigarettes and inappropriate lighters (mostly of half-naked women – cringe!) punctuate many of my childhood memories.
A distinct event comes to mind when writing this. It involves my mother buying cigarettes from a man up the road. As soon as we entered his house I remember being hit by a wall of stale smoke and seeing what can only be described as ‘bricks’ of cigarettes. These bricks were multi-packs of twenty, and I remember trying to build a house with them while my mother talked. Again, this horrifies me.
Despite this smoke-fueled vision of childhood, I grew to hate smoking. As I approached 8, I became very sensitive to the warnings I learnt at school. I no longer played in my grandparents’ smokey living room. Instead, I sulked. Words cannot express the passion I had. Think tobacco control’s answer to Greta Thunberg. Singing turned to sermons, laughing into lecture – I had turned into what my family would call a ‘pain in the arse’. As I approached my pre-teens, a very different girl sat under that smoke, and she was defiant.
I became very good at making a scene. When my parents would light up, I would rush to a window and start gasping for air. As soon as a lighter clicked, I would start violently coughing. This became an artform, and I was well-versed. Looking back, I feel sad that this little girl didn’t stick around!
Roll-on secondary school, and everything changed. I was desperate to be liked and I was determined not to be singled-out. For reference, I was a bit stumpy back then, and if I didn’t play my cards right, I would be an easy target. We all know how this story goes… one of my friends offered me a cigarette, which I took like a moth to a flame. My previous anti-smoking stance fell to the floor, and I slowly turned into a fully-fledged smoker. One turned to two, two to three, and before long I could go through 4 cigarettes a day.
I remember the first time my mum’s partner saw me smoking. I was in school uniform, and he saw me across the way. He had been on the scene for only three years at this point and had been the target of my anti-smoking campaign. I created so much grief for him that he actually quit (yes, I was that persistent!). Fast forward a few years, and there I was, puffing on a park bench. He looked at me and shook his head. What happened to tobacco control’s Greta Thunberg? Disappointment flooded his face. It simply crushed me.
From my earlier depictions, it will come as no surprise that the cigarettes were very easy to come by. If I wasn’t pinching cigarettes, I was pinching money to buy cheap cigs in the park. It was all around me, and it was easy to do. Most of the tobacco I was buying was foreign, which I now know was smuggled. My go-to brand became a fake or foreign version of Drum, a particularly strong rolling tobacco. Someone had told me that it was ‘natural tobacco’, which I thought was better for my health. So, there I was, with my ‘natural’ alternative. Looking back, I feel so naïve. I later found out that this brand contained a very high concentration of tar. Again, this fills me with anger as I was simply a child.
As a 27-year-old looking back, I feel a lot of resentment. I feel angry at my family for smoking around me. I feel angry that sellers thought it was ok to sell to a child. The consequences of both resulted in a strong addiction that took me over ten years to overcome.
While I can’t approach the sellers, I did have the opportunity to approach my mother. A few years back, I asked her why she thought it was ok to let me play in rooms of smoke, and why she didn’t do more to stop me from smoking. Her response was simply, ‘I had a lot on’. This remark not only sparked anger but resurrected the 8-year-old Greta Thunberg in me. I was livid! I could write about this interaction in volumes, but this story is for another day.
Reading this back, this account is bleak (sorry!). I guess the silver lining here is that I eventually quit smoking, and I am sharing my experience to raise awareness. In a way, writing this article has reignited the spirit of my past protesting self. That 8-year-old me is still there, somewhere! In light of this, if one person were to report or quit off the back of this article, my inner Greta would be so proud.
