A Village of Strangers

I woke up this morning and prayed; always a good way to start the day.

We went into the village today…and I can honestly say, I have never been more frustrated in my life. For the most part I received strange stares, and few people reciprocated smiles.

After a while, I figured they associated me with the “Mozzungas” (white man), but I received less warm, wonder-stricken stares than our group. This weighted heavily one me…I think I wanted to be accepted here. Don’t get me wrong! I wasn’t expecting everyone to look at me and automatically love and think of me as their own…but I definitely was not expecting the alienation either. I stand out with “Mozzungas” and with the Ugandans because I am not either of them.

Walking around the village, the group stopped by a store while we planned the rest of the day, as well as the rest of our mini excursion. We stopped at a corner and I noticed, across the street, four men sitting on a storefront. They observed our group closely, and then fixed their stares on me. No facial expression included; just blank slates. After a while of smiling and getting no response, I simply began to stare back. I wanted to yell, “Tell me what your thinking! Why the blank stares?”  But being aware of the fact that I was a visitor in their country, I had no right to make demands. I simply moved on, feeling defeated.

At our next stop, I was restless! I could barely stand to be with the group and I quietly wondered away into the lobby of a hotel. Inside I found an elderly woman, doing what seemed to be the budgets for the establishment. I greeted her kindly, and her response to me was warm. She invited me to sit and I did. She promptly returned to her calculator, and then I interrupted.

“What do you think I am?” I asked, sounding a bit more helpless than I had wanted to.

“I do not know. What are you?” She replied, smiling up at me.

“Jamaican…but I think people in the village are confused by me…” I pouted down at the table.

“Well, you do not look Ugandan. Where do you live?”

“America.”

“But you are like us. Some people are born in America but parents may be born in Africa. They are African. Or maybe parents never see Africa, but parents’ grandparents were African. They are still African. You are home.”

I stopped and smiled at her. I do not know the word for what I was feeling but I thought, “She accepts me”.

This is an identity complex between me and a continent that I cannot explain nor can even begin to have answers to.


Warmly,
Tianna Edwards