Chicago Tribune: In Her Travels Racist Assumptions Are A Constant

Source: http://articles.chicagotribune.com/1993-05-02/features/9305020133_1_passport-airline-employee-flying

In Her Travels Racist Assumptions Are A Constant

May 02, 1993|By Debra V. Wilson, a writer in Chicago.

As an African-American woman I have grown wearily used to the stereotypical expectations that society has of me.

At 35 I am often assumed to have a child of, say 20-when in fact I do not have children.

My religious background is assumed to be Baptist or Sanctified. I am Catholic.

And my family is supposed to consist of numerous siblings who were fathered by a variety of men. I am the product of a two-parent, middle class African-American family. I only have two siblings, and we all have the same two married parents in common, thank you very much.

It would seem that I should be used to the very narrow box that society has placed me in. Yet I am continually amazed at the reactions I get from those, white and black, when they become aware of my passion for international travel.

For instance, two years ago my mother and I were standing in a very long check-in line at O'Hare when a white airline employee announced that all passengers flying to European destinations could wait in the much shorter line to the left.

Since my mother and I were flying to Paris we enthusiastically left the long line that had not moved in 10 minutes and made our way to the shorter one.

But as soon as we stepped in the short line the airline employee said, "This line is only for passengers flying to European destinations."

I said, "Yes I know."

The airline employee stood staring at my mother and me and said, "Miss, you can't stand in this line unless you are flying into Europe."

To which I replied, "That's good because my mother and I are going to Paris."

The airline employee looked embarrassed and walked away.

My mother and I were the only two black people in the European check-in line and also apparently the only two people this airline employee believed to be in the wrong line.

There was also the time when, going through New York's immigration control, an immigrations officer looking at my passport with its numerous entries and exits from over 10 countries looked at me with a smirk and "jokingly" said, "What are doing going to all these places? Are you some kind of drug smuggler or something?"

I did not laugh.

But the most humorous reaction to my travel mania was only a couple of months ago when, while applying for a new position, I had to provide proof of citizenship.

I was informed by the personnel director that her secretary would take the necessary information from me.

The interviewer's secretary was an African-American woman about 25 years old. I asked her whether a passport would suffice as proof of citizenship. To which she replied with a very surprised voice, "Passport!" I handed the secretary the passport to photocopy.

When she came back she asked me, "How long were you in the Army?"

I looked at her very puzzled and said, "Army? I have never been in the Army."

She then said, "When I looked through your passport and saw all the places you had been I just assumed you must have been in the Army. I mean the only time I have ever hear of `us' going overseas is to go to war."

I took my passport from the secretary, who was still waiting for an explanation of my globetrotting, and I laughed.