'It's made me have an identity crisis': Londoners speak out about racist abuse

Jimmy Bapu, who is a food influencer, was inside the restaurant that night where he was filming a video.When he realised something was wrong, he stepped out to help – but was also racially abused."Look at the state of you," the woman said to him before using racist abuse.Jimmy told her he was British-born and from east London, and then a passer-by chimed in: "Take those opinions home. They don't belong in Walthamstow. Go home.But the racist abuse carried on."I lost sleep because of it," Jimmy says, "I haven't been the same since."He posted the video to his TikTok."The first three hours, it was just, like, full of hate. Like, pure hate as well, like, they're agreeing with what she's saying."It's like, 'Wow, they really don't like us because of the colour of our skin.'"But Ashlee Moyo is still waiting for answers after being singled out by a Leeds fan who made racist gestures at her as she was leaving the club's FA Cup semi-final against Chelsea at Wembley in April.She says the man first made monkey gestures towards another black football fan before targeting her."He literally looks right at me and then starts doing monkey gestures at me as well."And that was when I was like, my goodness, this is definitely not an accident, it's intentional and it's on purpose."I was just shocked. I was in a lot of disbelief. And then I was quite upset."And no-one said anything. Nobody flinched."As an avid Chelsea fan, Ashlee is used to going to matches on her own but now feels more wary."I've been to several different stadiums in England to watch England and Chelsea play."I've never had this experience ever in my life."So it did make me start to feel a little bit anxious about going to games by myself again, but I kind of was like, I don't want to let people like that win."I don't want it to take away my love for the sport. It's disappointing that now I'm thinking a bit more about it."The Met acknowledges that hate crimes, including racist hate crimes, have a serious and lasting impact.The force says it is setting up a new detective-led hate crime team to improve investigations.In a statement, Supt Owen Renowden, the Met's hate crime lead, said: "We're adapting our approach to improve both the speed and quality of our response, while strengthening outcomes for victims."A common theme running through all these stories is the disbelief that the racist abuse endured by our parents' and grandparents' generations is still a reality in modern London.Jimmy said: "I mean, we've been here generations in the UK and even though my parents have experienced racism, my grandparents have experienced racism, now I'm part of that, I guess, pain and I guess, all of that trauma."Ashlee and Uzma say they feel a responsibility to speak up."Perhaps in our parents' generation, they would have just shrugged it off," Ashlee says."I think that's what is different now is that our generation, when something is wrong, we are going to call it out."Uzma says: "We've got to make a fuss about it so it's really clear that this behaviour is not OK. As a generation, we're not going to put up with it."Our parents did. We are not going to. We have no reason to."Listen to the best of BBC Radio London on Sounds and follow BBC London on Facebook, external, X, external and Instagram, external. Send your story ideas to hello.bbclondon@bbc.co.uk, external