On camouflage and other ways to hide in plain sight

Notes on passing in Poland

Looking through old unfinished drafts of my writings, I ran across a note I wrote on 30 December 2012, almost one month after I was the indirect victim of a violent hate crime in Warsaw, Poland.

More than a year later, I have had several conversations with other transplants, migrants and expatriates about “standing out” in Dakar, where I now live, and how sometimes you just want to move around unnoticed.

In Senegal, if I wear certain clothing and limit my speech, I sometimes have the luxury of blending in when I want to be with myself. In Poland I did not have this option, but the thought of what we call “passing” in Black American, still crossed my mind while living there.

When I began thinking about how I could alter my appearance to “pass” I was reminded of the countless other people of African descent — all around the world — who went through life passing, to protect themselves or simply live a life we all are entitled to live. Their attempts were sometimes even more dangerous than “just living”. If the secret of their heritage was found out by the wrong person, that knowledge could be their death.

But still people made the decision to “pass”. And still I, while residing in a homogenous, Eastern European country, thought about all the possible ways I could change my skin, my hair, my lips, my nose to “pass”, for both safety and comfort.

Here is what I wrote in that note, a little more than a year ago, as I was struggling to deal with the repercussions of the vicious attack against someone I love:

These things happen everywhere. Yet I still had to face the fact that it didn’t happen some place else it happened here. And I became intensely aware of not only how people see me and what it is they see but how I saw myself in different environments.

I begin looking at my face in the mirror several times a day wondering who I could be. Who could I “pass” for as I traveled between communities as a way of protecting myself. A way to hide my identity to keep myself safe from aggressions.

As I read it today, I am still filled with anger and resentment. But not just for those who commit these acts, but for those who don’t have to think about these things and those who say, “Get over it,” when they feel conversations about race, religion, sexual orientation, nationality, and gender are too overdone to continue the discussion.

Although I know my feelings will eventually dissipate, at this moment, I am still occupied with how to let go and only be filled with the joy and gratitude I am intensely aware of for having made it through that experience LIVING. So many have not.

Give thanks is what my sister always tells me. Today I give thanks for both the knowledgeable and the ignorant. For they both have given me important life lessons.