khaly comes to visit and prepares whole fish

I knew a Senegalese boy once. And like all raised-right West African boys, he knew how to cook.

The first time he came to visit, I made sure I had done the grocery shopping. When he arrived and opened the fridge stocked with a couple of whole fish and ice cold beer, he turned to me, smiled broadly and gave me a hug. 

“Cheriiii...”

I had done good.

Like me, he loved fish. Our first meal together, on the day we met in Barcelona, he had taken me to a Senegalese restaurant. Unsure of what to order, I had figured the whole fish was a sure bet. When it came, perfectly fried and covered in a rich sauce over a bed of savory seasoned rice and slow-cooked veggies... I went to town. 

He had been visibly impressed with my skill at navigating the tiny bones without wasting any of the tender, sweet flesh. And when, towards the end of the meal, I snapped the tailfin off and not only gobbled up the ‘booty meat’ but also nibbled on the thin, crispy-fried tailbones, he was tickled to death. 

As an orphaned daughter of the continent, our shared fish fetish made me wonder if the country and people my ancestors had been stolen from were also his country, his people. 

“I’m going to cook for you,” he informed me after the hug was finished. Yeah. I had done real good. Together, we moved around the kitchen in preparation for the meal - him asking me, “Do you have...?” and me, responding affirmatively then fetching the requested item, or in the negative and then offering some possible alternatives. The scavenger hunt finished, I watched as he chopped some whole ingredients: garlic, ginger, onion, tossed them in the little porcelain mortar I owned, then added some random assortment of liquids and powders: Maggi, mustard, chile sauce... and began pounding them with the pestle until it was a chunky emulsion. This mixture would eventually get stuffed into each of the diagonal slits he made on either side of each fish. 

The art of grilling a whole fish over open flame is not one that i can say that ive consistently mastered, but one that i continually practice. This method of stuffing a powerful blend of aromatics and spices into is one that always brings a bit of nostalgia. A technique passed from one of the many teachers ive met on my travels. 

a conversation before takeoff

Flying a Kuwaiti airline from Spain to Greece. I find it somewhat comforting that the airline plays an Arabic prayer over the PA system before takeoff. I always say a small prayer before any major travel... for protection, for smooth arrival, for the flight crew, for new insights... and Arabic prayers are like musical meditations to me. My seatmate, a young Gaditano, reveals to me later that he (and i think everyone else on board) was freaked out when it started playing. 

”Is this some kinda joke? Are we about to end up in Egypt or the Middle East?” he says. 

We laugh about it. I assure him that the prayer is common for airlines based in Muslim countries. “Ahhhh!” he says. Its his first time traveling out of the country. I smile broadly and congratulate him.

“It’s good to travel. You have to travel a lot, especially while you’re young. Its like an education.”

He looks genuinely confused by that statement. '“Como?” he inquires.

“Well...” I say, (while thinking to myself, ‘Bruh. Didn’t you just learn something? And we ain’t even off the ground yet!’) “How do i know what I’ve been told about the world is true unless i go out and see for myself? Go to new places and learn about the people there, their language, their food, their music. Their... prayers?”

A light is slowly dawning in him. He tells me that he’s studying psychology. That he also plays flamenco guitar. He shows me a video of him playing. He’s good. And he has a smoldering intensity for someone so young. “But flamenco isn’t valued much in Spain,” he tells me. 
”Ah, cuz there’s lots of people who can play?”
Yep. 
”Well, that’s even more reason to travel. People love flamenco outside of Spain, but they usually can’t hear or see it live where they are. In my country, se flippan!”

He stops and repeats what I said, then cracks up laughing at my use of the colloquialism. We continue talking, I tell him he should try to find other musicians on social media who play similar music or who would like to learn more about flamenco. Invite them to come crash at your place if you have extra room, offer to teach the something about flamenco and ask if they’d be willing to do the same for you when you visit their countries. Ask if they would mind introducing you to their network of other musicians and music learners. Post videos of you playing on your Instagram, Facebook, etc. Use what you know to take you where you want to go. 

He ponders this for a few moments.

“That idea would never have occurred to me,” he muses aloud. “It’s like you said, you learn things when you travel and talk to other people who have experienced a lot.”

I nod. This sobrino is starting to get it. I pray that he does. 

colored

I’m at a bar with my Cape Town host, Lionel. In the course of our conversation, I hear him use the word, 'colored' multiple times. Finally, I ask, 'You keep saying that word, what exactly do you mean when you say it?' Lionel: 'It means mixed race.'

Me: 'Ohhhh... ok. We use that word at home, but it's just another way to refer to black people. It's antiquated, so it's mostly an in-group term.'

I continue, 'You know, I did notice when I arrived here that there was a whole set of people in CapeTown that I didn't really see in Jo’burg.'

Lionel (laughing): 'Yeah, in Jo’burg, you'd be hard pressed to find 3 colored people in any place. Hell, you'd be hard pressed to find 3 white people!'

He 's exaggerating... but only slightly. Later, we are at a bottle shop, where i'm purchasing 'supplies' (cuz, #RetailDrinkingIsForSuckas). A clearly inebriated, but totally harmless brotha strikes up a slurry convo with us. After a few exchanges with Lionel, in which he reveals he's from Congo, then declares, 'All Africa, one love!!' he turns to me. 'So, my sister, you're from here? You speak Zulu?' Lionel jumps in, protectively. 'She's colored. She speaks Afrikaans.'

Wait. What?

when I get to heaven

When I get to heaven, in a section way off to the side somewhere, I know I’ll find a spot made just for me. It looks just like my favorite tapas bar in Ciudad Real.

When I walk in, it’s full like always. And Santi is holding it down all on his own behind the bar, like always.

Though the place is blindingly white (everything in heaven is, you know. It’s the lighting.), there’s still those little piles of used, wadded up and tossed away paper napkins sprinkled along the front of the bar. Things can be dirty in heaven, too. If that’s what your heaven is like. There’s also a perfect sized space for me to squeeze into near the end of the bar.

Santi eyes me and ask-orders in that friendly, gruff way of his, “Díme.”

“Una cañita,” I reply. Almost before I’m finished saying it, he’s sliding a frosted glass filled with a foam-capped amber beverage down the length of the bar toward me. It stops neatly into my cupped palm. I know Santi’s waiting for my food order. I’ll give it to him. But not before I say hello to this oh-so-refreshing-looking beer. I gulp once. Twice. Man this watered down fizzy shit is the best cure for a hot Spanish day. It is perfection. It is life itself.

Santi prods. “Y para la tapa?”

“Rejos,” I reply without looking up.

Santi’s gravelly voice erupts like a low rumble of distant thunder, “Dame uno de REjos!”

Behind the saloon doors leading to the kitchen, hands begin to move. Grabbing the octopus legs, quickly battering them, then dropping them into the screaming hot oil. I wonder if it is the old woman or the young woman working behind those doors today. Sometimes, if it’s very busy, the young woman overcrowds the oil and they come out a little less crispy. I still enjoy them anyway. I’m only wondering.

A few minutes later, the young woman emerges and places the plate at the end of the bar. The door swings open when she re-enters. The old woman is sitting on a small chair in the small space, watching the young woman cook. The doors close and Santi retrieves the plate from the edge of the bar, then delivers it deftly to the space in front of me. Several crisp, still slightly sizzling sections of suction-cupped tentacles are splayed on the plate next to small stack of steak fries. I inhale deeply, the aroma of fresh fried sea critter filling my nostrils. I wait several patient moments for them to cool a bit before spearing one of the little legs with my fork. I bite through the thinnest and crispiest of batters into the tender-chewy flesh of the octopus. My eyes close as I savor the taste that is salty, mildly fishy and sweet all at once. For the next few moments, I, the amber liquid, the crispy fried octopus legs, and the golden creamy potatoes have our own little rendezvous at the end of the bar. At the end of it all, they are depleted. I am replenished.

After the last drag of the beer, I catch Santi’s eye.

“Me cobras, porfa?”

He waves his hand.

“Te invito, yo.”

I smile. Nod my head in deferential thanks. Then get up and make my exit. The blinding white light engulfs me. It’s one of my favorite things about heaven besides the food. The lighting. It’s simply glorious.

prickly pears

Every day, 2 times a day, I pass the house with the bountiful prickly pear bush full of fruit. And every day, 2 times a day, I covet. Tell myself, “Imma stop and knock on the door and ask them if I can have some of those prickly pears… they ain’t doin’ nothin’ with ‘em.”

Today, on the 2nd passing of the day, a man was out in front of the house, harvesting the big, plump purplish fruits. I hesitated for a moment. Do I really have time to stop? I’d told the service technician I was on my way to meet that I’d be at my house before he got there. I reasoned with myself, “At least I can slow down and holler out the window at the gent. Maybe he’ll be ok with me swinging back by later.” I slowed my car, let down my passenger side window; spoke: “I’m glad to see you’re picking those, I’ve been wanting to get some myself!” He smiled broadly. “Oh, yeah? You know what these is? You wanna get some?” Me: shocked and delighted at the ease of the invitation, pull over the car and put on my hazard lights. Hop out and deftly avoid the cars passing me to join the man pulling the ripe fruit from the tops of the cactus. The box he was depositing his harvest in was almost full. I eyed it, thinking I’d save my ungloved hands at least a little distress if I harvested from the harvest instead of directly from the plant. As I prepared my second request, the man spoke: “Yeah, I knocked on the door to see if somebody was home, but nobody answered. So….” Wait. What? This isn’t even his house!? I’m dying laughing on the inside. Emboldened by his boldness, I ask, “Can I just get a few outta the box?” “Yeah, gone head,” he cheerfully replies. I’m too far gone as an accomplice to be shy, but I restrain myself from taking too many of the fruit. “Yeen got no bag?” He queries. “Oh, I’m sure I have one in the car,” I say as I take my 2 handfuls back towards my trunk, where there is indeed a stray plastic bag inside. I deposit my pilfered booty, wave an enthusiastic goodbye to Mr. Prickly Picker, re-enter my ride and escape the scene of the crime with the evidence staining my hands.

#fortunefavorsthebold #ripeforthepickin #aclosedmouthdontgetfed #afunnythinghappened #swatl #swats #roguish

why travel to europe when you're black?

Why Europe?

It’s a question that many a black person who has travelled extensively or lived in Europe is likely to get from other black people. What you’re really being asked when you’re asked this question is, “Why would you, as a black person want to live in a place that’s so full of white people?”

In America, the ground, the very earth that i walk on is soaked and layered with generation after generation after generation of blood and suffering an oppression of people who look like me, people who i came from. There is a history of fleshly violence whose remnant energy radiates up from where the soles of my feet fall each day all the way up to the very top of my head. This is not something to be dismissed, even though i doubt that many ever consider this. I, and those like me, have been unwittingly surrounded by, inundated with and permeated by this energy since we were conceived. The cells and dna of those who made us carried this energy.

Imagine growing up in a house. A house where your loved ones live. Your mother, your grandmother, your great grandmother. They love you, care for you. But they have suffered, and they are depressed. The pain of whatever caused them to be in this state of depression has never been remedied or resolved, so the air of the house you live in with these people you love is filled with this heavy depression. It is the only thing you've known all your life. So of course, you too, will feel this depression. You will know it as normal, as just how things are.

Imagine then, that you have the opportunity to leave this house where you’ve always lived. To go away for 2 or 3 or 6 months, perhaps. To live among people who may not love you like your family, but are not depressed. For you, this may feel like breathing fresh, clean air for the very first time. For me, this is what Europe was like. At first, the untainted air in my lungs was too much, too odd, too open. But soon, I began to feel a stirring in me that I'd never felt. This fresh new untainted air was changing me. My lungs grew stronger, my skin glowed, I developed new nerves, new muscle. My breasts firmed, my sex hummed. the feeling of my womanness was heady and intoxicating to me. I was filled with such a sense of joy and wonder... it brimmed within me... oozed from my eyelashes, my fingertips, my toenails! I had feelings and sensations that I would never have dreamed were accessible to me... passion, romance and adventure that I could actually reach out my hand and grasp, draw to my lips and drink until I’d had my fill. I became a woman I could not have become if I had stayed in that depressed house. My limbs and leaves stretched and unfurled. In that other place, I would have been a bonsai woman... beautifully disfigured and dwarfed. Here, I flourished unfettered.

Still, I knew instinctively that this was not a forever place. I knew that I would eventually have to return to my loved ones. Was it not then my duty to stuff my pockets as full as I could of this new air, this fresh life, in the hopes of bringing it back home and sharing it with them? In returning to that place with enough light and nerve and muscle to do the work of healing even some of those old pains? Of drawing aside the heavy, dusty curtains in that depressed house and pointing out the window and saying to my loved ones... look! There is more out there than what we know in here. See! I have brought some of it back. Go out and fetch more of it for yourself. We will always have this house to return to, but we aren't trapped here. We aren't doomed to breathe only this air forever. So, when I went to Europe to live the for 6 months... just enough time 2 begin this becoming, Iknew i had not yet had enough. And so I went again. This time for 11 months. And then, a third time, for what I thought might be forever.

black in spain: the exotic beauty

Black in Spain is a series of essays and first-hand accounts of my experience living, working, and travelling as an African-American woman in Spain. My observations on race, color, and culture in Spain are meant to inform and enlighten as well as highlight the differences between the “black experience” in Spain and the US.

La Guapa Morena

“Que guapas morenas!” the guy from the beachside restaurant shouts in our direction. My friend Dominique and I turn toward him, smile, and simultaneously issue a coquettish reply of “Graciaaaaas!” We’re on our way back to my place after hanging out at the beach in Marbella for a few hours on a lazy Sunday afternoon. A few paces later, I turn to Dominique and remark, “You know if some random dude had shouted that to us in the States we wouldn’t be thanking him, we’d be looking for a fight!” We both laughed at the ironic truth in that statement. If we were back home in Atlanta, and a white guy exclaimed, “How pretty you two black girls are!” as we passed, our response would be markedly different.

In general, Spanish men (and quite a few women) are openly appreciative of attractive ladies they see on the streets. In my orientation class when I first arrived here, our coordinator even dedicated a section of her presentation to warning us about piropos, or catcalls, that the ladies in our group were likely to experience from men on the streets. Since that time, I’ve noticed that there’s a distinction made when a piropo or sentiment of attraction is directed toward a black or brown girl. Even the simple usage of the more specific morenas versus chicas or just plain “que guapas” to express admiration demonstrates that there’s some ‘other’ lens I’m being viewed through as a brown-skinned girl. The first time I got such a comment was on a solo trip to Barcelona about a month after I’d arrived in Spain. A 20-ish something guy passed me walking in the other direction, smiled and nodded his head with the look of someone appreciating a nice painting or a souped-up automobile. He mumbled loudly enough for me to hear, “Que buena esa morena,” before continuing on his way. At my age, I know how to appreciate a genuine, non-creepy compliment, so I quickly smiled in his direction without halting my stride. Still, every time I hear the sentiment echoed on the streets of Spain, I wonder to myself if the equivalent in English would translate to that dreaded not-quite-compliment, “She’s cute… for a black girl.”

Don’t Fetishize Me, Bro

To the collector, you are one-dimensional item. Everything of value or interest about you is tied up in the color of your skin, the texture of your hair, and the mythology surrounding them both.

Of course, there have been several instances when the ‘guapa morena’ comment hasn’t been so welcome. Take, for instance, the guy who I encountered on one of my first trips to the local library in Ciudad Real. Only minutes after introducing himself to me, and telling me howguapahe thought I was, he asked me for a kiss. I was completely taken aback and more than a little creeped-out by the incident, and when I recounted it later to a friend – a Spanish man – he explained that it was rather common for some Spanish men to assume that a brown-skinned girl equals easy prey. He went on to explain that most of the black women in Spain have immigrated from Latin America or Africa, and some of those who are experiencing financial problems or looking for a way to remain in the country permanently are eager to accept the advances of almost any Spaniard if it means financial security or the promise of becoming a Spanish citizen. For this reason, some Spanish guys will test the waters, so to speak, to see how much they can get away with when meeting amorena.

Then there are those who take their brown-skin attraction in a slightly different direction. I call them ‘collectors’. They – both men and women – are intrigued by the rareness of black flesh. To them, what is rare is seen as more interesting. And the person who’s able to possess a rare thing for themselves is made more interesting as a result. The having of this rare object then, is something of a status symbol for the collector, even if the having is only temporary. To the collector, you are one-dimensional item. Everything of value or interest about you is tied up in the color of your skin, the texture of your hair, and the mythology surrounding them both. Ironically, this pretty much makes the collector the bizarro version of your garden variety racist, for whom everything odious and worthless about you is based on your skin color and its associated mythos.

It doesn’t take long to identify a collector. He or she will probably lead with something that specifically refers to your race. They may even confide in you – completely unsolicited and out of the blue – the fact that they’ve always wanted to ‘be with’ a black girl or have mulatto children. While you’re struggling to put your eyes back into your head from the ridiculousness of such a remark, the collector will probably be leaning in to get an appreciative stroke of your skin or tug at your hair, or quite possibly even commenting lasciviously on another black person passing nearby, completely oblivious to the fact that they are creeping you all the way the f**k out.

The Mouths of Babes

“Mommy, that man has black skin!”

I involuntarily snap my head in the direction the voice came from, and wrinkle my face up at the little girl’s overly loud comment. We are at a seaside resort in southern Spain – a place heavily populated with both Spanish and non-Spanish holiday makers from other parts of Europe. Among the rest of the crowd tanning on the nearby shore, playing in the pool and sipping cocktails at the bar, my friend – a native of Senegal and a longtime resident of Spain – and I are the only brown faces (and bodies) in sight.

The little girl who made the comment looks to be about 7 or 8 years old. From her accent, it sounds like she’s from the UK, where I assume that she would have had more exposure to black people than a girl of her age from Spain. Why, then was it so novel, so unusual to see a person with ‘black skin’ that she felt compelled to blurt it out in public? Why had her mom who was sheepishly grinning in our direction and hurrying her little one along before she could say anything else –  not yet trained her that blurting out such a thing in public wasn’t exactly appropriate? Meanwhile, my friend, who’s probably well accustomed to receiving such comments and stares, is completely unfazed. He smiles and waves at the little one while I brood silently in the background.

Days later, when I’m reflecting on this incident, it occurs to me that this little kid was no different than many full-grown Spaniards I’ve encountered that momentarily lose their cool and some of their senses when they see a black person – saying and doing something that leaves the unaccustomed (like me) frowning and wondering, “What the f**k?”, while those who are used to these outbursts (like my Senegalese friend), simply offer a patronizing smile and the equivalent of, “Awwww… Bless your heart!”

Can I Touch It?

It’s Christmas season in Spain. Even though I’m missing family time and the Christmas traditions I’m accustomed to back in the US, I’m still enjoying my first Christmas in my host country. I’ve finished checking off the last of the gift recipients on my relatively short Christmas list, and I’m looking for the finishing touches to put on the gifts that I need to wrap and deliver to local friends in Ciudad Real before the long winter break.

I ducked into the little store thinking they would definitely have the gift ribbon I was looking for. It was, after all, a chino*, and chinos carry at least 4 of everything ever made. As I was preparing to check out, the Spanish girl working in the store who’d helped me find the ribbon remarked to the Chinese lady behind the counter, “Que guapa, no?” (Isn’t she pretty?) “Si! Es guapa!” the other woman enthusiastically replied, smiling in my direction. I thanked them both profusely. Before I could finish my ‘gracias’, La China (the Chinese lady) recounted in her heavily accented Spanish that she used to work in a neighborhood in nearby Toledo where there were other girls… here she paused to rub the skin on the back of my hand to indicate what kind of girls they were. She said that she loved seeing them, and whenever they would come in to shop or talk, she would rub their skin. Here, she paused to stroke my hand again. “Muy suave!” (very smooth!) she beamed, then suggested the Spanish girl have a go. “Siiiii…” La Española replied in awe, after stroking the back of my hand for herself. “Que suave!!” By now, my eyes were as big as saucers, my brow furrowed, and my smile a tentative, bemused one. “Como un bebe,” (like a baby) La China continued, smiling brightly with confirmation of her knowledge. As I handed her the coins for the ribbon, she couldn’t resist one more stroke. The transaction complete, I hurriedly stuffed the ribbon in my bag, managed to bumble out another ‘gracias’ and a ‘feliz navidad’, then swiftly pivoted and exited the twilight zone.

In Spain, and there’s a sort of no-holds-barred, ‘I’m not even gonna question if you’re ok with this because I know you’re ok with this’ aspect to the commenting on and touching of black skin and hair that is markedly different from the US. Here, complete strangers feel no qualm about remarking loudly about your ‘different’ features or even getting in a quick pet. Like the one time, when I was walking through a crowded club in Malaga, and a woman I passed yelled out over the din of the party, “I like your hair!” Then proceeded to shove her hands into my picked-out ‘fro just before asking if she could touch it. Or like an entirely different chino incident, when I was perusing the aisles for some household necessity, and another shopper – a middle-aged Spanish woman – decided to grab a few of my braid extensions and marvel aloud at how they got that way, how long it must have taken to do them, and what sort of material they were made of. Part of this uninhibited touching is cultural – Spaniards have a completely different concept of personal space than Americans. That is to say, by American standards, Spaniards don’t really have a concept of personal space. Close-talking, double-cheek kissing, resting a hand on a shoulder or back while conversing with someone – all of these are interpersonal conventions that might make the average American feel uncomfortable.

As a black person living in a country like Spain where the population is largely homogenous – at least in outward appearance – it’s not an uncommon occurrence to find out that you’ve instantly become a walking museum exhibit. For many, you’re one of the few chances they have to get an up-close look – or touch – of this rarely-seen specimen that is a black person. Does that mean it’s ok for someone to breach your personal space for a rub of your skin or a grab at your hair? No. But it does help explain why it’s happening. Why you’re being stared at on the street, in the grocery store, on the metro. Yes, even now, in the 21st century, where black people are more prominent in international media than ever before, and you’d think that the sight of a black person walking down the street minding their own business wouldn’t cause a stir.

Yet, if I’m completely honest, I can’t gloss over the fact that I’ve experienced some unwanted touches from my fellow countrymen in the United States. Particularly when it comes to my hair. The fact that I wear my hair natural and often change the style it’s in, has frequently sparked interest from co-workers and associates, to the point where they can’t resist a touch. Usually though, this kind of uninvited touching only happens with people whom I share space with regularly or have known for a period of time. And even then, the social norms regarding personal space in America makes them do so with a bit of timidity and hesitation that seems fitting for putting your hands on someone without explicit permission.

I also have to admit that sometimes it feels damned good to be positively noticed for the color of your skin. Back home in Atlanta, there are so many beautiful men and women of color of every shape, size, and type that I would scarcely garner a second glance on the streets. Being good-looking and black isn’t really worth commenting on when damned near everyone around you is good-looking and black. So, after each of these experiences, I often find myself torn between feeling weirded out and feeling honored and appreciated in a way that I’d never be on my home turf. After many months of being guapa’d and groped in public and private, I’ve finally learned to take it all in stride, and more often than not I have a laugh at it – if only to myself.

Case in point: one afternoon, late in the school year, one of my Spanish roommates knocks on my bedroom door. She wants to introduce me to some family members who are visiting. After greeting them, my roommate’s mom says, as sweet as she can, ‘Me gusta tu color’ (I like your color).

What I think is…

What? This old thing?

Girl… you better get a good look while ya can! I’m about to hop in the shower!

Ya sure? Cuz, ehhh… I dunno… I was thinking of changing it.

Oh. I… like… yours… too?

I’ve been growing it since birth.

But, what I say is:

“Graciaaaas!”