A Black Person's guide to Eastern Europe

Last week as our class was wrapping up, I struck up a conversation with the professor of the incoming class. He is black, I am black so naturally we needed to talk. Why is the subject of another post. He asked me in Spanish how I was (not sure why since he teaches ESL to a Chinese woman), I responded in Spanish (mistake) and he naturally began asking me additional questions in Spanish that I started answering in a combination of English, Spanish, and the language I'm studying. He corrected my Spanish (unnecessary) and then we (finally) began chatting in English.

I told him I was heading to Eastern Europe. He laughed and said I was in for an education and warned me about the racism in Eastern Europe in a way that suggests I will long for the sublime discrimination of the United States. Then he gave me the brief which most older black professionals give to younger black professionals. It's hard to describe it but it's parts cautionary tales, part mentoring, and part pat on the back for still being one of few. But that was just for my job and the good old U.S. brand of discrimination he had observed at my employer over his decades of work with them. For the Eastern European brand of racism he would only hint at the delights in offense I was sure to experience.

I would ordinarily categorize him as an angry black intellectual. He had some over the top name like LaFontaine Higginsworth, greeted everyone in Spanish though it was clear we weren't studying Spanish, and had the social ineptitude to correct my Spanish when I was just playing along to be polite. Unfortunately, every guide book I have read about this country has a section on race and it's never a good news story. One in particular recounted a story about a stray dog that mortally attacked a foreigner. The natives sided with the dog. The author noted it was partly because their culture loved dogs but also partly due to racism. Wow. A dog living on their streets deserved more consideration than the visiting businessman? A dog *they* aren't even taking care of? Wow. Just wow.

Another noted that if you were black specifically, you can forget about dating anyone local because it was just too much. Well shit, then. Guess I'm going on a 2 year fast which in my dating world is nothing. Essentially it's situation normal. Still it's weird that total legit travel guides (e.g. Frommers, Lonely Planet) would make a note of race like they have. I'm skeptical. Just as it is in the U.S. I think gender matters. Minority women of all creeds move differently in society than their male counterparts. I also think in a foreign country as a representative of the U.S., being American matters. I'm American before I'm anything else which will make me wary on the local dating scene anyway. Women aren't the only ones running the seduction for green card schtick. Most importantly though, all of these guides have been penned by white people. I'm not sure if they ran a Soul Man experiment or just kept meeting random locals who talked about how much they hated black people and foreigners in general. Aside from the anecdote about how foreigners stack up against stray dogs, there wasn't much in the way of explanation.

So...I think while I'm out there, I shall pen a guide for the brown people who randomly have this area of the world on their bucket list of places to see because I'm confident I will have experience there that completely discredits the notion that not being from around there means that if I'm attacked by a mangy stray, the locals would be rooting for the dog. But if it does, after I heal, that shit is getting written down too and they will be off my Christmas list FOREVER.