David Batty

I think my adoptive parents were sort of being led to believe that, you know, you say this and that's it.

And it wasn't the case because it's something that very much occupied my mind.

I did because when I was in my mid-teens, I think around 14 or 15, I began to search through my adoptive parents' bedroom cupboards trying to find my adoption records.

And I did find this partial record, which included my birth mother's name and my birth father's name.

Yes.

It really sort of took me aback, largely because...

of my birth father's identity because he was Iranian.

It was a very deliberate choice that I wasn't told that.

I had this conversation with my adopted dad last October and I asked him about this.

And he said, well, you know, the verifice was that it just didn't matter.

It was in this partial record that there was this letter that they had been sent by the adoption agency, which described me.

And it said, you will note the child's father comes from a Persian family, was the way they worded it.

But the child is, I think it was very fair and shows no sign of any colour.

So that was it.

It was like I passed as white.

So it just was a non-issue.

I think it had a much more profound impact in a way than learning I was adopted.

But I do remember just sort of looking in the mirror and just thinking, who on earth am I?

Whose face is this?

Whose life am I living?