HOTUC COMMENT SPOTLIGHT on “What to Say to the Haitian?”

The HOTUC team appreciates your engagement. Your comments on the different stories that we post in fact sometimes spark the need for larger conversations. In these instances, we have decided to create a new feature on HOTUC that puts YOUR comment in the spotlight and is replied to by the writer.

On March 1^st HOTUC posted “What to Say to the Haitian?” (click title to read story)

Anonymous wrote: My brother is married to a first generation Hatian. She hates African Americans. She married my brother, because she thinks he isnt African American, b/c our mother is white, and our father is black. She hates his children that he fathered by a Puerto Rican, b/c she hates puerto ricans. She, and her family, completely look down on American Blacks, and personally, i find that ridiculous..she doesnt even consider herself black, and she is one of the darkest people i have ever seen> While I dont like what happened in Haiti, there is no way i would support them, their country and their racist ideology..and i would encourage african americans to take a good look at how Hatians really feel about us before we send another cent to that country.

Don’tLettheJCrewFoolYa responds: Thank you for your comment. However, I would encourage you not to project your experience with one Haitian on the other 12 million Haitians on the planet. Not to mention the fact that I suspect that your issues with your sister-in-law go far deeper than her attitudes towards African Americans.

Like every post-colonial society, Haiti has many reminisce of "divide and conquer" colonial power politics. In Haiti, it is simply not enough to share the same skin color or the same African lineage. Everyone's just Haitian. So, after 200 years of independence and power abuse, Haitians (whatever the hue of their skin) have done just as much to hurt other Haitians as whites did to non-white Haitians back in the day. As such, the idea that once in the US, Haitians SHOULD relates with Black Americans and therefore joins their community is foreign to them. And, it's also unfair. The community of African Americans as we know it in the US today is a direct product of unique policies in US history--namely the 1/5th rule. There is NO OTHER PLACE on the planet where one drop of African heritage constitutes being Black. In every other post-colonial society where there were either enslaved or colonized Africans, there is a name or category for every hue of Black. Is it right? No. But from distinctions such as mulatto (Latin America), Dulla (Trinidad), or Coloured (South Africa) we have various and distinct communities of color around the world. It's only in the America that a Halle Berry or Barack Obama are considered 100% Black.

So, for a Haitian, the idea that they belong to the community of Black Americans just doesn't connect as easily. But the distinction is not unqiue to the Haitian community. Nigerians come here and stick to their own, as do Trinis, Jamaicans, Ghanaians, etc. Dominicans don't think their Black either. The problem is greater than the issues between you and your sister-in-law or Haitians and Americans.

I spent several years working at US Embassies around Africa. I remember a Malian man pulling me aside in the US Embassy lobby. He pointed to the picture of President Bush, Vice-President Cheney and Secretary of State Colin Powell and asked, "How can they say Powell is Black? He is the same color as the other two!"

So, instead of trying to project your personal sense of culture identity on others, I would encourage you to take a moment, recognize and understand that people's identifies are rooted in their unique histories. The Black American experience cannot simply be projected onto every person of color around the world. When you do that, you only show the world how blindly you've adopted yourself to the same American SUPERIORITY complexes that kept so many people who look like you and me (and darker) oppressed for the greater part of the 17th, 18th & 19th centuries.

Besides, whatever anyone’s issues are with other cultures/races (or themselves) this should never get in the way of the human heart and help when someone is in need.

L'union fait la force

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The Caribbean Gas Passer

by today’s Urban Chameleon contributor

I love my West Indian people and I love our food but you can’t bring it everywhere, especially not every day to the office.

My colleague, let’s call him Max, loves to bring his curry goat, rice and peas and fried plantains for lunch on most days. If it’s not that it’s another Caribbean curry dish of some sort, which is cool lawd knows I get down on the same grub but during work hours I’m on a toss chicken salad with a vinaigrette dressing diet.

For the very reason that every day around 3PM, when I assume that Max’s curry has attempted to digest a wretched stench invades our cubicle space. Since Max and I are the only ones who are seated in this area of the office I’m usually the only one experiencing these violent episodes of suffocation.

Every now and then someone will walk through our section at this time and notice the putrid smell and make a joke, “Phew! Who farted?” Max will try to cover this up by complaining about a trash bin that hasn’t been taken out but he can’t fool me I grew up with the same curry and I know a curry fart when I smell one.

Jesus. What to do? Do I bring HR into this?


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Yesterday’s Newsweek Post

by today’s Urban Chameleon contributor

My girlfriend and I were reading yesterdays blog post Caribbean Country Side Bafoonery here at Home of the Urban Chameleon. We too were talking about that daggering story that we also read in Newsweek. I think we were more upset that we were getting put on to the latest about our culture from Newsweek!

After moving out the ‘hood, it reminded us that we actually need to visit the ‘hood more often than just getting our hair done. Spend a little time taking back in the rhythm of the streets, find out about the latest hip hop and dancehall mix tapes from Abdul on the corner, while eating a beef patty with coco bread and taking some ackee and salt fish to go. Pick up those priceless and price conscious groceries that these higher end supermarkets either don't have or charge an arm and a leg for like Bustelo!- there is no reason this coffee should be $7.00 when it’s 1.99 in the ‘hood! Hey maybe even see the weed man, go to the park and light up that dutchy and chug a 40ty for old time sake. Let me stop, I was drinking White Zinfindale even from back then with the dutchy.

As Urban Chameleons no matter where we go we owe it to our selves to always keep that one foot in the ‘hood ‘cause we should never be finding out about the alleged broken penis' of our brothas as a result of daggering in media first.

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Damn Tiger Woods, How’d You Do It?

by today’s Urban Chameleon contributor

My fabulous Urban Chameleon girlfriends and I call our selves looking to evolve our fabulousity this summer and decided to look into golf- anything to throw white people off with our diverse skill set. Now mind you it’s not like we go looking to throw off white people but if they would stop acting so surprised by our accomplishments then we’ll stop.

Anyhoo hoo to the hoo, the golf obsession started last summer during a trip that my husband and I took with my Jewish best friend and her Jewish husband to the Berkshires. Her husband took us to the driving range to give us a beginner’s lesson. My Jewish girlfriend is not that into golf and much rather go hiking but me being the Urban Chameleon that I am insisted on taking in every note and detail he gave me about perfecting my form just so that I can one day show up on the course in a kente cloth dashiki, Dior shaded and a head wrap and shut’em down. The following day I was ready to get back out there but my Jewish friend insisted on us having a "girls" day sipping Pinot by the pool. As much as I want to expand those skills nothing beats sipping Pinot by the pool so we let the boys have a golf day instead. My husband who is from south west Philly returned at the end of the day after playing 18 holes for the first time to say, “Golf is no bitch ass sport, I’m tired as hell.”

But this year the girls and I are game! (With the exception of the Jewish one who rather watch with Pinot) This past weekend, a Haitian, a Trinidadian, a Jamaican and a Panamanian showed up at Chelsea Piers bright and early ready to start golf lessons except for one tiny problem, THE COST! Not only is golf no bitch ass sport it’s also no cheap ass sport. No wonder there are more brothas playing basketball. Damn Tiger! Much respect and another clear example of how it takes money to make money he clearly is seeing the return on his investment. But we young adult Caribbean Chameleons are currently in the stage of trying to pay off Visa and Mastercard for all that already invested fabulousity before leaping into any additional kind of extreme investment. So trying to prove a point will have to wait. I wonder how much tennis is?

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How the Urban Chameleon Came to Be...

by creator and editor-in-chief HaJ

One day, a group of friends and I were sitting around trying to think of a term that best describes people like us who approach the world from parallel perspectives, having mastered the skill of seamlessly transitioning into corporate America—from its private grade school classrooms, ivy league universities, corporate board rooms and social climbing ladders—back out into our bilingual/patois/urban slang speaking, hip winding, kinky hair handling and curry spice eating America.

We are the approaching 30ty sumptin', urban professionals of color born into the hip hop generation and raised by parents who were in search of a better life having migrated from the Caribbean, South America and Africa or those born here who lived to see Jim Crow Laws become the Civil Rights Movement— They shared an ambition of carving out their road towards the Great American Dream. Our families made homes for us in the largely immigrant communities nestled in the metro-city 'hoods of Brooklyn, Queens, Harlem and the Bronx where a walk down our street could still served up bangin’ plates of rice and peas, curry goat, plantanos, and collard greens and the rhythm of the streets were a flavorful mix of Afro-Caribbean-Latino-Hip Hop that would easily seduce us into gyrating our hips. We reveled in the pulse and comfort of our urban/Latino/Caribbean ‘hood, but when it came to our education our world stopped. It was as if the batteries in the boom box died and the sensuous aromas of all that good food was locked in the freezer. Having to wake up an extra two hours earlier every day to get ready for our commute, we witnessed, through sleepy eyes, regentrification at its finest as we were sent across town where we were only one of two kids of color in the best private schools. Our parents would drop us off, tell us just how much they loved us and off we were to learn another kind of world. A world that we would have to know if we were going to one day run a company or maybe even...a country.

We did what kids do and tried to fit in, realizing that rules in school were different, simply defined by someone else’s culture. Even the way they played “red light green light” was different from how we played it around the way. But after a while, having learned the new rules, we no longer fit in around-the-way. Soon, names like "Oreo" were whispered in our direction condemning us for the verbs we were now conjugating. Our families set aside our tears and feelings of isolation that came along with struggling to define ourselves in opposing worlds and instead took comfort in knowing that we were being prepared for a fiercely competitive world.

We continued to thug our way between the two worlds keeping up with Yo MTV Raps and -refining our best versions of the whop, Kid ‘n Play and the boggle for those around-the-way dance offs and our families continued to endure laborious work and financial strain as they often handed over their last dollar for our classical music lessons and summer travels around the world.

So, who did we end up becoming?

Today we are the cross-sector, world traveling, social switching consumers that can be found pumping down Fifth Ave in our Louboutin’s with a Bergdorf shopping bag trying to catch transportation back to the ‘hood for those two dollar codfish fritters before going to see the Dominicans to get our hair done.

We are the over achiever who works through the night prepping PowerPoint presentations to an iPod shuffle playlist of Lil’ Weezy, Jay Z and Buju Banton – and then maybe flip it to Jamiroquai and then brings it down with some Yo-Yo Ma

We’re the ones who identify the Caribbean/Latino/African customer representative, switch into the dialect of their homeland and score ourselves a free bump to first class then sit back with a glass of Kir Royal and chuckle at the person next to us who tries to figure us out peeping our selected reading material of The New Yorker, Financial Times and Vibe Magazine (with T-Pain in platinum and diamond fronts on the cover)

But that’s okay, we’re accustomed to the confused looks, inquisitive stares and the ignorant questions from those who can’t seem to figure us out— Not quite Cosby kids and not quite Bebe’s kids. We inherited our family’s hustle mentality with a cosmopolitan twist where we go from skiing in the Alps of Switzerland to being upside down gyrating on a float at a West Indian Day Parade.

We are Urban Chameleons.

One thing is for sure: no matter what your cultural background, the ticket to the American Dream is still embedded in White America. So, we know there must be all kinds of chameleons here hustlin' towards their American dream as they juggle more than one kind of world. These are just our tales as we know them and we find humor and comfort in sharing them…this is the journey of the Urban Chameleon.

Please enjoy and contribute to the journey.