This blog post was written in the Philippines on 10/23/18. I was hesitant to post this because these are my own raw feelings and experiences, and I risk being misunderstood, but I’m learning that my vulnerability can help bring awareness and healing to others, so here it is.
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The dictionary defines racism as prejudice, discrimination, or antagonism directed against someone of a different race based on the belief that one’s own race is superior.
I’m African American and proud of it. My parents are black, my grandparents are black. It’s the color of my skin, my features, and my hair texture. I’m proud of my heritage.
When I committed to the World Race, I did not expect to experience racism from White Americans living abroad. It was the farthest thing from my mind when I met 2 white men here. One was genuinely nice and curious about what I was doing here in the Philippines far from the US. The other was exactly what I’ve experienced back in New York too many times to count. It’s hard to accurately explain what happens to someone who hasn’t experienced it, but I’ll try to explain.
It’s the looks, the comments muttered under the breath, the stares, and this time it was the questions they asked me that they didn’t ask any of my other teammates and were borderline rude…..
Flashback: Before the World Race, I was an employee at New York’s number 1 hospital. I lived outside the city, so every workday, I caught the train at a stop where 98% are Caucasian. Basically, I rode the train with mostly white men commuting in to Manhattan NYC as well. Most were genuinely polite and just interested in their morning Starbucks and newspapers. Others treated me like I am singularly the source of all the problems going on in the USA today. There were the “move aside, these seats are for us” comments and there were the comments to their friends like “I wonder how she makes enough money to commute with us into the city every day.” I took it all in stride… Most times just by turning up my music or podcast louder. After working in NYC for over 2 years and riding Metro-North’s peak hour trains Monday through Friday, I became used to it, but not numb to it. It still hurt. There’s no bitterness in my heart thanks to Jesus, but it still hurts to remember the instances. Such is what it often means to be Black-American in today’s world. It’s more subtle than what my grandparents experienced when they were my age, but the racism is still there.
This is one of the many reasons why I cut off my hair earlier this year and stopped straightening it. I wanted to wear it how it naturally grows in… kinky, coily, curly, thick. It was a statement to myself, in addition to the fact that it’s just easier to manage in its natural state while I’m overseas. I am who God created me to be. Black and beautiful. For some Black women, straightening their hair doesn’t carry that weight, but for me it started to recently. It was almost like I was trying to fit in with all the straight-haired white people around me. I cut it off since I am no longer a person that needs to fit in. I am becoming who God created me to be – kinky hair and all, no longer afraid to not fit in. I am a new creation. Raised to life in Christ.
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Now back to the racist microaggressions I experienced here in the Philippines from a non-Filipino. It caught me off guard even though I am definitely in the minority among World Racers and the Adventures in Missions community. The night at dinner that I had the interaction, I wrote in my journal and then went to bed early. My team thought I was just tired, but Lord knows, I just wanted to pray and sleep it off.
It worked. The next morning, I was reading a book by Bob Goff called “Everybody Always – Becoming Love in a World Full of Setbacks and Difficult People.” Everyone should read it! It talks about how we have complicated Jesus’ words to “love your neighbor.” It’s true. We complicate the words so that we don’t do it at all. But, this is no excuse. I need to love both those who love me and those who don’t, those who misunderstand me and those who do.
If I could do the interaction all over again, instead of walking away from the negative comments and rude questions, I would intentionally ask the man more about himself. Everyone loves to talk about themselves, so I would turn the conversation away from me and his assumptions about me towards himself and what he’s doing in the Philippines. If that didn’t work, then I would probably excuse myself and walk away anyway. Either way, I would consciously try to “love my neighbor.” After all, I’m here on the World Race running after Jesus, building His kingdom, and bringing His love to the nations.
Since then, the Lord convicted me to let it go and learn from it. So, this blog post is me letting go of it and learning a new layer of loving my neighbor. It’s time for me to mature in this area of 1 Corinthians 13 love.
“Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
Love never ends. As for prophecies, they will pass away; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will pass away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part, 10 but when the perfect comes, the partial will pass away. When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I gave up childish ways. For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known.
So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.” 1 Corinthians 13
In courageous faith and for His glory alone,
Sharon
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