"Alors, c'est pour vous? Ou pour votre dame?"
("Now, is it for you? Or for your lady?")
I was at the Wednesday Rue de Grenelle marche in Paris by the Motte-Piquet and Dupleix Metro right under the overhead metro bridge.
This was one of those flash-bang-scram moments of my life.
A tragicomic moment.
A strip in a Superheroine comic where I was prone on the floor, my ego oozing out of my being like egg-yolk, the white and yellow parts crying "Neener, neener, neener, Where's the place for a Browner?"
"Non, non, madame, c'est pour moi." It's for me, I retorted, glaring at the French woman behind the cheese counter.
Ten years after this incident, I still smart when I recall it. I have had my share of insults over the years. When I returned a library book a few days late in Dar-es-salaam, Tanzania, a local hurled insults at me, adding that "all Indians were thieves." I was 12 years old but I realized then that the world could be an ugly place. At a Hong Kong hospital, a Chinese woman accused me of not losing my postpartum weight because I was "plain lazy". I bristled. At least she was honest. At the Ritz in Paris, the door boy wouldn't let us in after looking at our scraggly Mowgli faces. In New York city twenty odd years ago, our family was followed for several miles by a fair-skinned gentleman who waited outside a shop until we decided it was time to call the police. At San Jose State University two decades ago, a fellow student of mysterious eastern origin asked me if I were Hindu and told me that I must convert, "for only Jesus could save" me. I told her I had been saved many times over by my pantheon of Hindu gods and scooted out of there, calling out to elephant-headed Ganesha to save me from myopic minds. And who can forget the snide remark from a coworker many years ago about my arranged marriage: "Are you really in love with him? Or are you simply tolerating him?" At the time, this coworker didn't have a love life or a marriage, so I was still one up over her, I thought. Should I cut her down to size? Or should I let it pass? I let it pass, telling myself that it was pointless to needle a grouchy woman who was guaranteed to be laid off before ever getting laid.
But to be prejudged by a cheese vendor because my skin was the color of Sri Lankan maids who lived with vain wealthy French dowagers and their Scottie dogs and exercised the pale, lonely limbs of their employers in the morning sun at a French park? I came home and tossed my American sneakers. I made up my mind that day to never leave my doorstep in Paris without looking like a million dollars.
The City of Light began radiating warm rays of kindness on my tanned skin. The lady at the dry cleaning shop started chitchatting with me. The woman at the boutique 'Le CouCou chez Nous' would walk up to me at every visit asking whether she could help me choose something. The chain-smoking owner of Couleur Cafe sat down to chat whenever I went there for my favorite croissant and cup. Ah, Paris. The City of Light and The City of Heavy Prejudices.
I came back to America a year later and the first thing I shed were my pumps, my pants and my attitude. I put on the sweats. And the pounds.
Yesterday I stood at the counter at Nob Hill Supermarket, Large Grade AA Brown eggs in hand. "And, ma'am, did you have any trouble at all finding your things today?" the white man at the counter asked, a genuine smile playing on his face. "Not at all, sir, I know my way around here, thank you!" I replied, flashing back a smile.
CAMPBELL. 2009. Age: approximately 47. Weight: 120 pounds, give or take 8 more pounds.
Height: 5', 2.5".
Hardly cigarette slim. Indian women Always Get Fat.
Well spoken in English.
Sneakers. Sweatshirt. Sweatpants.
Skin color light copper. A tawny color, the color of an Indian Summer. Pleasant Woman.
You can follow this conversation by subscribing to the comment feed for this post.
Sigh...no matter how often it is said, but a book is mostly judged by its cover, isn't it?
I feel the Bay Area is one of the very few places where such prejudices are not common place. I lived in the mid-west for a few years, and saw quite a bit of it.
In fact, it is quite prevalent in India too. I went from a small town to a mid-sized city for my engineering. My brains were sharper than most, my English much better, my father richer, but my appearance was well, small town. I was, as expected, looked down upon :(
Oh well, now we are in a better place :)
Posted by: Kashmira | 19 February 2009 at 02:12 PM
My name, the color of my skin and my 'non-Indian' accent often throws people off and I have no choice, but to answer questions like "Are you Hispanic, Lebanese, Turkish etc.?"
When I explain that I am from India, I am forced to be at the receiving end of further ignorance which is expressed by, " But your English is so good, you have like NO accent at all!!"
I grew up in Bombay and then went to Mangalore to pursue medicine, where I faced the other extreme of people's judgement! My classmates would snicker at me and pass comments like "Who does she think she is walking around campus in jeans!!" I didn't react, knowing well enough that my jeans covered more of my body than their entire back and belly revealing saris!
Ah well, to judge is human?!?!?!
Posted by: RT | 10 May 2012 at 01:25 PM