In case you didn’t realize it or maybe you’re just not that observant, but I want to take this opportunity to clarify any confusion that there may be- I’m a white. Yes, I am a 23 year old Caucasian female from the United States of America. I come from a more-or-less middle class family and I’ve received seventeen years of education, including a four year bachelor’s degree program. I have a house and electricity and indoor plumbing. I personally own a computer. I have a car, a bike, and a pair of rollerblades. I have two bank accounts- checking and savings- which actually contain money (the amount doesn’t matter). I have family and friends who loves me, imperfections and all.
For the first time in my life, I am realizing the magnitude of what all this means. Being here in Uganda, I’ve had no choice but face my white privilege, it’s been right there in front of me since the moment I stepped off the plane in the Entebbe Airport. Everywhere I go, there seems to be a soundtrack on repeat- “Mzungu, bye! Mzungu bye!” (mzungu is the word for white person). I smile and wave as I pass by. It’s hard to move through town without being stopped on several occasions to shake hands with the many children that seem to be my shadow when I foot places (footing is what they call walking here). I must say, I prefer to be called mzungu than nangobi- which is the term for a person of royalty, of the king’s clan. The other day, I was overwhelmed with feelings of hatred towards the color of my skin. I hated the fact that the pale pigment of my skin placed me in a position of superiority over the people around me. Nothing I did, nothing I said seemed to matter in that moment, all that was taken into account was the volumes my whiteness spoke. It just doesn’t seem fair to me- that because my skin is white- I’m treating as a nangobi- a child of royalty.
The harsh reality that my skin color speaks is becomingly exceedingly clear- it represents power, importance, status, wealth (none of these which I feel like I presently have when I’m in the States, mind you). Yet, in this context, I do. Even as a poor college graduate with multiple student loans which I’ll be paying off for the next 20 years, I am realizing I have an education which most here could only dream of. There are endless opportunities of employment waiting at home there for me as a nurse; there is no need for me to worry about job security. When it comes to power, if I disagree with a policy or law enacted by my government, I wouldn’t feel helpless, I wouldn’t just accept it. I would call my Congressman, I would lobby my cause, or I would go to Washington and participate in a march. I suppose I have more power than I thought… I do have a voice, an influence, however small it may be. I am only one. I’m learning the truth of this statement. In the face of the many injustices I’ve encountered, I am recognizing that I cannot change each and every one of these circumstances. I am only one and I can’t take on the worlds’ problems and fix them. I can, however, be fully present and engage in relationships with those who are living in their midst. However small my voice my be, I now feel the burden of responsibility for making the stories of these people known, sharing their experiences with all those I meet. Ignorance is no longer an excuse. Apathy only precipitates the injustice. Even as a woman, my whiteness places me in a position of importance over many of the Ugandan men I meet. It’s a custom here for woman and girls to kneel in their greetings; I however, am exempt. In fact, the occasions when I’ve tried, I’ve been scolded and told never to do it again. For me to kneel, I’d be disrespecting those with whom I was trying to show respect. Wherever I go, respect is given to me, not earned. I’m always given the best seat, the first serving of food. I do not go in want here- that’s for sure!
My whiteness is a part of who I am, I cannot pretend that its not the color of my skin. I can’t wake up tomorrow and suddenly fit into a crowd here in Kamuli. As much as I despise it at times, I cannot strip myself of it. I can’t blend in, I won’t be treated as everyone else here. I’m white. I’m an American. I’m a woman. I’m educated. I have power and influence. It’s so hard to explain that in America, I am on the lower end of the socioeconomic ladder- that I was a free lunch kid, a medical access youth.
During my education, I learned about the Civil Rights’ Movement and the 1960s. I’ve discussed diversity, racism and white privilege with friends during my college years. Yet nothing prepared for me for what I’ve been facing here in Uganda. In all my years of growing up on a farm in rural Pennsylvania, I was only ever acutely aware of what my white privilege was and what it meant. I knew it existed yet I didn’t know its force. I never had personally encountered the privileges it availed me- or I was ignorant of them which I don’t doubt to be true. An African American friend of mine once said when talking about America (paraphrased), “that no matter if we talk about racism or not, it still exists…At the end of the day, I’m still a black man living in a pro-white world”.
The truth of that statement is piercing- I am learning to live with its weight. At the end of the day, here in Kamuli, Uganda, I am a white woman living in a black pro-white world.
