Americas | existabovethenoise

Takiyah Gray is a Brown University alum, who is currently an elementary school teacher in Vietnam. With her Trinidadian passport in tow, she treks the world in search of good eats, teaching opportunities, and sane couch surfers. She is a talented dancer and yogini, whose Trini roots keep her near tropical beaches as frequently as possible. Existabovethenoise.com readers may remember her as the friend I was staying with in Thailand back in January – check out the My Thai post.

We’re not in Thailand anymore, Toto. Sure, there are still roosters crowing at all hours of the day. Yes, there are street vendors hawking their wares—from fly-flecked pork innards to hanging pieces of chewy, salted squid, to the ever present random assortment of locks of various shapes and sizes. But this is Vietnam, and the people here sure do not like to smile at the odd looking stranger.

Some people think that the best moments of life unfold when you put yourself outside of your comfort zone. In her latest book, Committed, a mere $2.50 per Xeroxed copy in the backpacker district of Ho Chi Minh City, Elizabeth Gilbert agrees. She says that “I had ago learned that when you are the giant, alien visitor to a remote and foreign culture, it is sort of your job to become an object of ridicule.” For better or worse, I have been happily toeing that uncomfortable line for much of my existence, ever since my mother decided to bring me from Trinidad to America at the age of 2. Maybe this initial trip is what sealed my future as a world traveler, because since then, I’ve been crafty and fortunate enough to peak into life in countries like Sweden, Brazil, and Spain. (I say crafty, because anyone that knows me KNOWS that there had to be an ulterior motive to joining the glee club back in high school– clearly it was the summer trip to France). Not surprisingly though, nowhere has that discomfort been more present than here in South East Asia. Here, I am a complete foreigner, and boy do I stand out. In this part of the world, it’s not just my language that pegs me as different, but my height, my skin tone, everything that I’ve ever used to define myself. And believe you me, wherever I am the locals cannot wait to figure out what a tall black woman is doing in their country of size 4 shoes and K-pop idolizations. Though we in America are proud to have elected our first black president 4 years ago, many people on this side of the world are still incredulous that Americans can look like me. Add to this the fact that I still retain my Trinidadian citizenship and people are all the more confused. I, myself, pause to figure out which country I will say I am from today—do I go for the mildly puzzled look when I say that I am from the US or the completely dumbfounded look as I try to explain about where the Caribbean is?

No one needed this geography lesson more than a woman I recently interviewed with. Now, as a visitor in South East Asia, I am grateful for the opportunity to work as a teacher. It’s a downright privilege when my peers and I can travel, work and realize a standard of living that is generally higher than most of the population around us (simply because we speak English and carry TEFL degrees). My year of living in a beachside house on a Thai island was made possible by precisely these things. But they aren’t always enough, and apparently, having made the move to Vietnam, I was starting at square one all over again.

At this particular interview, I quickly learned that I was missing — what in the Dominican Republic they call — “buena aparencia.” Instead of a normal interview, where the trained and professional interviewer and skilled and eager interviewee go back and forth about the school, expectations and relevant work experience, I spent the entire time trying to prove that no, Trinidad and Tobago was NOT a country in South Africa (?!) and that YES I grew up with English as my first language. The interview ended with a cold, “If you are short-listed for a position, I’ll let you know in a few months.” The entire “interview” lasted a grueling 10 minutes. I had spent more time that morning trying to figure out an updo for my twists! Never before had I been in such a hostile interview environment. Later that night I spent many hours plotting the exact flavor of the very pointed email that would say thanks but no thanks, up yours, and oh yeah, I’ve attached a world atlas for your convenience.

Was I surprised that this level of ignorance could come from a fellow educator? The sad truth is no, not really. The fact is, before embarking on this journey almost 2 years ago, I had braced myself for many more scenarios like this one. Fortunately for me, Thailand never presented an issue, and I was able to find work without problems. Now that I’m in Vietnam, however, other brown-skinned expat friends, namely Filipino teachers who face similar prejudices, have warned me about this kind of overt racism. I’ve heard of many different ways to this overcome the issue, including lying about citizenship and leaving out the requisite photo that most schools ask for in their applications. What’s a girl to do?

For the most part, I realize that I travel to learn and to have others learn about me. So I put up with the stares, the odd looks, the oogly eyes, and the scores of parents with varying levels of discretion nudging their children as I go past, to make sure that they catch a glimpse of me. I spend the extra 10 minutes at the grocery stores, hunting out the soaps and lotions and deodorants that don’t have whitening ingredients in them. I choose the work environments where I know I will be treated with respect. I know many expats, mostly men, who are happy to make the permanent leap over to this side of the world. Me? I am grateful for the experience to observe these moments; at the end of it all, I’ll be glad to get back to my little corner of Kansas..erg…Boston.

Alyson L. Palmer was born and raised in the Seattle area. After undergrad she spent a year in NYC and two-ish with the Obama administration in DC. Now gearing up for her third year of law school at UDub = Univ of Washington. Timing seems sweet for her to jump back on the campaign trail for Obama 2013, but as yet she has no comment on that subject.

Before I moved to New York City, a co-worker cautioned, “on the west coast, we’re wash and wear. On the east coast, they’re dry clean only.” For you East Coasters, that was a dig at you. Those of us on the “Best Coast” are decidedly more relaxed and we like it that way. We don’t walk like something is on fire. Unless, you know, it is. We don’t consider traffic signals mere suggestions, but rather a useful tool to regulate that pesky balance between pedestrians and vehicles. And when we talk about having an apartment or office with a view, we don’t mean a view of other apartments or office buildings.

Don’t get me wrong, I love traveling east. I graduated from college and high-tailed it to NYC as fast as JetBlue could carry me. You folks have the market cornered on revolutionary era buildings, cobblestone, and national monuments – all symbols of years gone by that a wonk like me enjoys. I mean, you occupy 2/3 of every US history book…and you know it. I don’t think I am letting out any State secrets when I say ya’ll have a superiority complex a mile wide and an ocean deep.

True, the west is the rebellious, upstart little sister with all her unbridled energy running around without a care in the world, because Thomas Jefferson never signed a proclamation on her desk and Sojourn Truth never ate at her counter. But, that is what I love about the west! She can invent and invest in whatever strikes her fancy. There aren’t as many traditions on the west coast, so we make our own way – do things that don’t fit inside a box constructed in 1799 or 1999 for that matter.

This idea manifests most clearly in our ideas of style and culture. If the east coast is Paris, the west coast is Tokyo. We’re quirky in that “sure, this doesn’t match, but I meant to do that” kind of way. We aren’t afraid to make mistakes and start trends we will regret in 5 years (flannel anyone??). We drive with the windows down rain or shine, because we aren’t worried about the leather in our BMW becoming discolored. An advertisement saying “vintage clothing” means someone actually wore it before and not just to the tents last February. Street style on the west coast isn’t folks trying to make the “trends” page in Elle magazine, it’s stuff we actually wear while walking on the street to work, school and play. And we indulge in music, art and science as part of our everyday life, because “work-life balance” isn’t a synonym for the “mommy-track”. We exercise by paddling, biking, skiing, surfing, and climbing, because not to would be an unforgivable waste of this gorgeous landscape. After all, we’ve got all those adventures 15 minutes away from home.

Our refusal to walk the path of the settlers does have its downsides. Why it takes 4 hours to get to the next city of note is beyond me. A road trip stops being fun when you realize you are still in the middle of nowhere 3 hours later. For an area of the country founded on exploration, it’s ironic that we’d be so adverse to cutting away from the pack and starting anew just a few miles down the road. We still struggle with mass transit, because we are mostly a collection of big small-towns. Nobody had the foresight to think about what would happen when an increase in population and business would force us to travel not just sea to sea but north to south. Now that our traffic is legendary, maybe we’ll get it together and figure out high-speed rail. Last and least is our own complex. The one that makes us not as sweet as the south with its barbeque and twang, and not as refined as the east with its universities made from the plantations of the Founders. We are accent-less, our food and architecture are riffs off of someone else’s invention, and our refusal to be pinned in a direction makes us a bit directionless.

But for all of her deficiencies, the left coast is absolutely the best coast. Because when we say we “went for a run in the mountains,” we’re not talk about a vacation. We’re talking about Tuesday. We’re not opposed to being nerdy and techie, because our nerds brought us Microsoft and Google and Apple. We aren’t opposed to innovative scholarship, but when we use the phrase “ivy of the west,” we mean the school is distinguished and high caliber, not pretentious.

We may be drinking our own Kool-Aid on this one, but we like being “not like the rest.” If you must liken us to anything at all, think of us as ducks. We make life look carefree, but below the surface we are working hard as hell and reaping the benefits of a clear night sky and a cool ocean breeze. You east coasters, on the other hand, reap the benefits of using of our MACs & PCs to power through 14 hour days – I mean, stay ahead of the curve.