BOLTON boasts a true mix of different cultures living together. Michael Carroll of the Bolton Multicultural Arts Group spent four and a half years collating and editing revealing individual stories for a fascinating new book "Meet the Family . . .". Here, Angela Kelly re-tells just one of them.

SAHORA used to live in Daubhill in Bolton and went to Deane School. She was a typical 14-year-old Asian girl who liked Bollywod movies, the latest pop bands and Tom Cruise.

She met Paul at school when they had to work in pairs for chemistry lessons. "We began to get on well together, then one day Paul asked me out.

"Being a Muslim girl I was a bit apprehensive at first because Paul was not Asian and his religion was Church of England. However, I agreed. As we were both still at school, there could be no serious relationship anyway."

Sahora and Paul used to eat their lunch together and sometimes met after lessons in a nearby park. Her Asian girlfriends were sworn to secrecy.

Each Saturday, she went into Bolton town centre with her friends. But she would buy two pasties and meet Paul at the top of The Market Place multi-storey car-park - it was here they shared their first kiss.

The relationship, although never physical, carried on for two years during which time the couple's feelings deepened.

At the back of Sahora's mind, however, was the fact that her family were strict Muslims: "I wasn't even allowed to go out with a Muslim boy never mind anyone else from outside our religion."

Sahora and Paul both started attending Bolton South Sixth-form College, meeting whenever they could. "We had a mutual understanding and respect for one another. I loved him for the sense of freedom he gave me," she said.

But, disaster struck when one day the couple emerged from the lift in The Market Place, to walk straight into a friend of Sahora's father. Their secret was out.

Back at home, her mother wept and her father was very angry. "From tomorrow," he told her mother, "Sahora is not going to college, she will stay at home."

Sahora screamed that they could not stop her, she had exams coming up. But her father was adamant, and he told her that he would look for a suitable Asian boy for her to marry.

"So that was that, no more college. The first week at home was hell, all I could think about was Paul," said Sahora.

She felt helpless in the face of her parents' determination, but after three weeks told them she wanted to find a job and get on with her life.

"My father issued a warning not to see Paul or any other boy. If I did, he threatened to marry me off without my permission," she said.

So, Sahora got a job as a sales assistant in a clothes shop and enjoyed meeting people and spending her wages. She did not see Paul and heard that he had finished studying at college and gone to university.

"Fortunately, my dad didn't mention marriage for a few years. When I was 20 years old he sat me down and told me it was now time to get engaged. He informed me that a boy was coming to visit within the next week.

"I agreed to the meeting, but told my father if I did not like him I would say no to the marriage. My father accepted my answer," she said.

The next week, amid great domestic preparations, Rahil arrived with his parents, and the young couple were allowed to talk alone together.

"From the first glance of Rahil I thought he looked OK. We began to talk and he told me he was a primary school teacher.

"From then on the conversation began to flow, something clicked inside me and I felt at ease talking to him," said Sahora.

They arranged to meet privately in a local Pizza Hut and talked at length.

Sahora began to warm to him and they met again.

A week later, Sahora's father asked if she liked Rahil enough to marry him. "I said yes'. Then he revealed that Rahil had made the same decision."

The couple married at a local mosque and had a big wedding reception at Deane School - where Sahora's teenage romance had blossomed.

"It still took me a year to really get to know Rahil, but I grew to love him very much.

"I thought I had been in love with Paul but, looking back, at the time I was too young to know what real love is,"she said.

Now, Sahora has two daughters, aged six and nine, and Rahil's job has taken them to live in London.

"I did not believe in arranged marriages, but they do work out as long as the couples are not forced into it," she adds.

l "Meet The Family . . ." by Michael Carroll is free to voluntary groups and organisations by ringing 01204-546044.