made me think of a question that I wanted to ask: What was your most “fish-out-of-water” experience? I mean a social situation where you were clearly in the minority for some reason, however you would define it.
For me, it was when i bumped into a friend of mine in Quebec City when we were students, and we had a beer together. Then Jean said he was meeting some friends, just to get together, and did I want to come? i said sure.
So we went to a hotel room and there were a bunch of guys and gals, drinking beers. I quickly realised:
There was a Parti québécois convention on;
Jean was a member of the PQ;
Everyone else in the room was not just a member of the PQ, but dedicated members who come to PQ conventions and then hang out in a hotel room in the evening, drinking beer and talking sovereigntist strategies;
I was an anglo federalist.
There was a bit of silence at first when Jean introduced me and my accent quickly identified me, but a Laurentide or two eased the situation, and I ended up in some interesting discussions about the survivial of French civil law in a majority common law country, and other tidbits of Québécois history. Still, initiallly awkward. Or un peu de gène, you might say.
When I’ve been out and about doing Democratic campaign stuff in recent years, there’ve been several times when I’ve been the only, or one of only a few, white people in a political gathering - sometimes rather large ones. Those have been good, even instructive, experiences, giving me at least a small and brief sense of what it means to be in a minority. I’ve only very rarely sensed any hostility or unwelcoming vibes on such occasions.
There’ve been multiple times when I was the only non-white person in an otherwise all-white church. Even though the people were friendly enough, it felt awkward to stick out like a sore thumb and I eventually couldn’t keep it up.
A friend and I were visiting Chicago 20-25 years ago and we took a shortcut through Washington Park to go to the Museum of Science and Industry. We were the only white people around and we got a few odd looks.
My wife and I were in Barcelona in late 2019 when there were protests and rioting over the sentencing of Catalan separatist leaders. One night we went out for supper and the rest of the restaurant was filled with people coming back from a protest.
My wife and I traveled to Borneo on our honeymoon, and at several times were far enough off the beaten path that random locals would ask to take selfies with us because “look, white people!”
Years ago I was sitting in a bar on a Saturday afternoon, listening to a guy playing electric violin. He was very good and I was having a great time. When he finished his second set, I offered to buy him a drink and he accepted. We sat talking, then he said he was going to another bar for his second gig of the day.
I asked where the bar was, thinking I’d relocate my ass and listen some more. He “warned” me that it was a black bar (he was black). The bar I’d been at was in a white area and the musician was the only black person in the house.
I followed him to the other bar, went in, ordered a drink, while he set up and did a soundcheck. I could tell people were looking at me, possibly the first white guy to enter the bar, a little funny. Then a guy across from me yelled, asking why I was there. I replied that I just wanted to enjoy the music. He yelled back that he didn’t like white folks. Then a couple of guys told him to chill, the music was what was important. I offered to buy a round, all but the first angry guy accepted.
The angry guy started up again and the musician stopped playing and said I was his friend and the least everyone could do was respect him and treat his friend better than he was. The angry guy said he was leaving, and I told him to stay, I’d leave. I put some cash in the musician’s tip bucket and left. A few of the guys I’d bought drinks for told me to stop back when angry guy wasn’t there. I never did go back there, I’m not a confrontational kind of person.
Once on a drive down to Atlanta I stopped somewhere in NC for a sandwich and a beer. The place I stopped at was just some little dive bar but there wasn’t really anything else around. I walked in, sat at the bar and asked for a menu. The white bartender asked if I was a member. “Member of what” I was about to reply, but the only other guy in the place, another white guy, said, “He’s fine. He’s with me.” The bartender stepped away to grab a menu and I asked the other guy what that was about. He said it was technically a “private club, so they could keep out the you-know-whos.”
I didn’t bother to follow up to find out exactly who “you-know-who” is, I literally just backed out of the building without saying anything and kept driving until I found a McDonald’s about 40 minutes later.
Then there’s that time I accidentally walked into a gay bar in Rehoboth Beach and didn’t realize it for quite some time, but I had a great time there. Even went back the next day.
When I first moved to the DC area, in the summer of '88, I lived with my brother the Army vet. One day I needed a haircut and the nearest barber was in the Nauck neighborhood. This twentysomething White boy had walked into a much smaller version of a certain movie and may have been their only White customer in, like, ever.
Years ago my regular barber was away on vacation, so I decided to try a different barber shop in his absence. I think I had a coupon or something. As soon as I walked through the door I realized everyone in there was heavily tattooed, pierced, biker types. Definitely not my kind of crowd. But I felt like once I’d walked through the door it would be rude to just turn around and leave, so I stayed and got a haircut. And it was fine. Everyone there was nice, and the woman who cut my hair actually turned out to be my neighbor from just around the corner.
Then there was the time I had to travel to Bangalore, India, for my previous job. Just walking down the sidewalk from the hotel to a nearby restaurant I felt very conspicuous. That was the first time in my life I’d been in a situation where I was the only white person.
My wife once got invited to a co-worker’s backyard BBQ so we went. I(straight male) thought it would be a variety of people from her work but apparently we were the only friend(s) she invited.
She’s gay and shares a place with her girlfriend, which is no big deal and I knew beforehand, but her entire friend base was nothing but lesbians.
I was fine with it and was doing my best to get into conversations but I did feel a bit awkward and some of them seemed kind of annoyed I was there.
I was 17, and staying in Puerto Rico for two weeks, living with a business associate of my father, and his family, where they had a 17 year old son. We got along fine, they knew enough english to communicate with me, I could recognize enough spanish words to get some basic understanding. But outside of that family, hardly anyone I met or associated with spoke much english. I felt rather out of it and isolated until I met Felix, another 17 year old guy in the neighborhood. He spoke absolutely no english but he was happy and outgoing, and we spent hours and hours together pantomiming conversations and ideas, and teaching each other rude songs from our own language. He joined us on most of the island trips the family took us on, to beaches, rivers, waterfalls, parties, etc. We got to be great buddies, despite/because of having no common spoken language.
The other 17 year old whose family I stayed with was fun too, he came to the mainland with me and stayed for a month, extending his stay with us because he was having such a good time.
I had parked my car in downtown Cleveland in the 1970s and was getting ready to go into a strip club. A guy walks up to my window and makes the “roll it down” motion. When I did he sticks a knife in the window and demands my money. I had like 20 bucks so he adds, “And the watch too”. I looked at my $10 watch and told him, “It’s a Timex”. He goes, “Oh, wow!”, grabs it and runs off.
I spent an academic year living in Japan. Since it was in Tokyo I had it pretty easy, but even there, there were people who liked foreigners and people who didn’t care for foreigners. This was forty-plus years ago. I gather it is still difficult for foreigners to live like locals, difficult to rent an apartment, sometimes difficult to make friends. Some of the rules of society are difficult for a foreigner to figure out without a guide or mentor.
Even further back, September 1967, my first day on the University of Chicago campus. I arrived quite early in the morning so I decided to take a walk around the neighborhood. I walked south, maybe on University Ave. My dorm was, I think, at 57th Street, or maybe 55th. I walked until the campus apparently ended, which my memory says was 63rd Street – there was a cyclone fence for a ways on University, and then all the way across on 63rd to the next block. Suddenly I had gone from a mixed middle-class area to an almost exclusively Black neighborhood just across the street. I felt awkward and out of place. Nothing happened and no-one noticed me, as I tried to walk casually to the next corner. I was so naïve and inexperienced, it was laughable.
I’ve been to two bachelorette parties as the only male. It was fine. I hooked with the bride and another lady at one. Turns out that was bad luck for the marriage, though: it didn’t last. No hook up at the second one, but I did go as the first bride’s date (we stayed in touch and started dating*) to the second party.
A couple of years ago my then senior high school aged daughter was in some school activity and for that purpose she asked me to buy her a stick on bra.
Hmmm, now that’s something well outside my normal comfort zone.
At base point, I didn’t know such things existed.
So by necessity went shopping on my Todd Malone.
The shop assistant was very helpful, but for her technical questions of size, colour, duration of use, difference in material were a bit of a paradigm shift for me and no I don’t want to feel the difference or have a demonstration of how to fit them. Thank you.
All worked out fine, but spending 30 minutes thinking about my daughter’s breasts is something I will happily not do again.
I generally feel at ease where ever I go. But, I feel out of place in churches. So for weddings, funerals, baptisms and such I just feel odd.
Re Gay Bars And Such
The first time I walked into the Henri (pronounced Henry) David Halloween Ball I felt like an intruder for about half a heart beat. Then, I realized I was finally surrounded by people who loved Halloween as much as I did. I entered one the costume contest categories. It was not the first time I didn’t win a costume contest, but it was the first time I didn’t deserve to win. I’m currently adding more details and props to my Cultist Of Cthulhu costume for this year.
Yeah, I went into the Gay party room at a Con. After a little confusion, and getting my butt grabbed twice(It was a Con, I did not get upset), I found out they had the best parties.
I had a case in East Palo Alto. Non-black guy, in a suit. Out of place.
