Hip hop has a vagina. - Brown University

for people to take 3-5 min showers. When I was discussing this with one of my Australian friends they
mentioned that they could shower and wash their hair in that amount of time. I explained to her that I
can taka a shower in that amount of time but washing my hair requires some serious time and labor. She
looked at me because she did not understand the texture, curliness, and thickness that African-Americans
must deal with when washing their natural hair. Needless to say, I was a light bulb in her darkness.
Regardless of all of this cultural dialogue, I must also mention that this educational process has not
always been beneficial. There have been moments in which I have been objectified and trivialized.
Returning again to the issue of my hair, one of my friends told asked his colleague if he had
touched black hair before and when he said no, he told him to touch my hair. When he told me that
he had done this I had to then tell him that what he had done was offensive and explained to him
the issues around objectification. Another moment was the fact that one of my friends said, “If Obama
messes up he will be lynched.” Although my friend did not mean anything offensive in an overtly
racist way due to his ignorance of the issue of lynching and African-American history, I had to then
educate him on our violent and brutal history. Moments like these remind me that although learning
from others is always a valuable experience, sometimes boundaries and ignorance go a bit too far.
In total, my time in Whitley has been amazing. Learning from others, picking up the Australian vowel patterns,
and just hanging around has been great. My presence has had one of the most interesting impacts on
both the people around me and myself as well. Australia has reminded me just how important it is to meet people
and to be a body in the room -- a reminder of a world and experience outside the normative and their own.
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