Twin Ambitions - My Autobiography by Mo Farah Page A

lots of the same people. By this time I was training with the distance runners; Tania was more into the sprint and hurdles events. We’d get chatting by the side of the tracks between events. She was smart, funny, warm. We just clicked from the beginning and soon became really good friends, hanging out socially. Tania lived just round the corner from my house. Occasionally I’d go round to her place for a cup of tea with her mum, Nadia, her dad, Bob, and her older brother, Colin Nell. Nadia had an interesting background. She’d been born in Saudi Arabia, was half-Yemeni and half-Palestinian and had mixed Arab heritage. Nadia spoke Arabic; she could even recognize one or two Somali words since the languages were somewhat close. Sometimes Tania would plait my hair, back in the days when I actually had some. On one occasion she happened to be riding her bicycle up and down the street, recognized my front door and randomly decided to pop in and say hello. I answered the door. We didn’t talk for long. Five or ten minutes tops. As soon as I closed the door, Aunt Kinsi was on my case.
    ‘Why is that girl knocking for you?’ she demanded.
    ‘We’re just good friends,’ I said to my highly sceptical auntie. ‘It’s the truth. She goes to the same running club as me, that’s all.’
    I’m not sure my aunt believed me. But back then, Tania and me
were
just good friends. It took a while for things to develop between us.
    I thought about Hassan all the time. Although he lived thousands of miles away, I felt very strongly that he was a part of me, and I was a part of him. It was a powerful thing, that connection. Sometimes I would find myself wishing that we all lived in one house, one big happy family, but life isn’t always like that. And for me, there was no point dwelling on it. The situation was what it was. I knew that Hassan would always be there for me, and I’d always be there for him, and that one day soon we’d see each other again. That was good enough for me. It had to be.
    Mum had gone back to Somalia by this point and located Hassan. They were living near Hargeisa and I would talk to them from time to time. Mum would go to the shop in a neighbouring village to wait for my call. On one occasion I told her I’d ring a few days later, but something came up and I wasn’t able to contact her. I later found out that Mum had arrived at the shop early that morning and stayed there all day waiting for my call. She’s like that, my mum. If someone tells her something, she expects it to happen. If someone tells her they’re going to meet her at such-and-such a place at such-and-such a time and they don’t show for three days, she’ll still be waiting for them three days later. She doesn’t have time for people who don’t stick to their word. Once she decides on something, that’s it. There’s no going back. I was only able to speak to Mum by phone over the next several years until I was finally reunited with my family in 2003. I’d tell her to bring Hassan so I could talk to him. But it was hard.
    I threw all my energy into training, going extra hard in the runs. In sessions at the club I’d be on the case with Alex, asking him for news on the next race, what events I’d be competing in, what club we were up against.
    ‘I want you to do 3000 metres in the next young athletes’ league meeting,’ Alex would tell me. ‘Judging by the standards that we’ve seen, you should win it quite easily.’
    My next question was, ‘What’s the record?’
    Before long I was way ahead of the other kids in Alex’s group, beating them far too easily. I was ready for the next step. I can’t recall exactly when it happened, but after one session I asked Alex if, whilst maintaining our regular Thursday sessions together, I could start training on Tuesdays with the older age group of runners coached by Conrad Milton.
    ‘Sure,’ Alex said. ‘Why not?’
    Conrad had run for Great Britain as a junior. After his running