One thing that I observed in New York that I still don’t fully understand is that African Americans there are very different from the African Americans here in the Midwest. Our African Americans are nice, smiley, chatty, and sociable. You can strike up a conversation anywhere. People are open and receptive.
In New York, I continued engaging with African Americans like I do around here, but it didn’t go over well at all. Whenever I would open with “Oh, what a cute puppy. What is his name?” or “I love your outfit. It’s so pretty,” people would give me a stink eye. The guy with the puppy literally shrank back from me like I was threatening to attack him with a samurai sword.
I went to the New York Macy’s, which is a store that always employs black women. Our local Macy’s is a feast of sociability. The black store attendants are always, “Oh, hello, Miss Clarissa. These are such pretty outfits that you found. They’re going to look so amazing on you.” And I respond with, “You look pretty fantastic yourself, Miss Tenisha. Look at those shoes. They are a dream.”
At the New York Macy’s store, I wandered around the store floor for 15 minutes, trying to find the checkout counter where the store attendant would not look like she hated the very concept of human contact.
Before you tell me that all New Yorkers are like that, it’s not true. Hispanics in New York are exactly the same as Hispanics everywhere. I don’t know about white people because I didn’t come across any in New York who were not tourists. There was one very chatty white Uber driver, but he was Ukrainian.
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