Charlotte is very racist
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8/11/2012
I lived in Charlotte for 7 years and even finished college there. Horrible place if you're Asian or just not prejudice. I once worked somewhere where my favorite clients, a couple, told me they were moving. I was shocked. They told me it's because they didn't want their newborn growing up in such a racist city. They were both Caucasian, and your average middle to upper-middle-class family. It pained me to see how real it was when people of the same race as the majority who were ignorant toward me for years, saw the same thing I had. In many ways it was quite refreshing too. In 7 years living there, I had 1) a suited and well-dressed Caucasian male (I'd call him a man, but a real man wouldn't be racist) with two other professionally dressed of the same, all with long, trenchcoats, pass by me as I left The Fox and Hound restaurant and actually say to me, "That must be a hard job!" I didn't pass them until a few blocks away from the restaurant and I wore a very modest close to the knee skirt and a nice modest top that didn't even show cleavage. That a** made me feel low, bringing himself up. He wanted to think Filipinas, even one born and raised in the South in the US, were all mail order brides and prostitutes. 2) I walked in a commercial tire/oil shop and the guy on the phone was speaking at regular pace, normal, not too fast not too slow, just normal. Suddenly, he gets off the phone and says, "Maaaayyyy Iiiiiii heeellllllpppp youuuuuuuu???" I wrote the company, they called me back, I told them I didn't want to sue just wanted to let them know how stupid he was, and they fired him, and gave me several discount coupons...but I never returned. Not even to this day to another one. But I was glad for their formidable attitude. 3) I brought my then boyfriend's dog into a vet, I walked in and no one greeted me. I sat thinking they're busy in the back, even hearing voices and not even muffled. The door chime even rang and it was a very small clinic. Then a Caucasian enters, same door, same chime sounds, and out comes the receptionist. 4) I was in a grocery store. Quick stop. I see two well-dressed, in suits again, gentleman across the aisles looking over at me. They had to be in their 50's. One looked over his shoulder at me and then back at his friend and started saying, fairly loudly, "Ching chang chong..." I was so appalled, I walked halfway over to him and asked loudly in clear English, "DID YOU JUST MAKE FUN OF ME?" Tail between his legs, he said a stupid answer of "No." 5) I was at the mall, and as soon as I stepped on an escalator, a man passes me and says, "Konichiwa"...I'm so American, I guess, that I probably didn't even spell something he believes I know, correctly. 6) I was in a restaurant, they had karaoke, I was asked by someone who was pointing to the karaoke DJ, "Oh, is that your husband?" 7) I was in another restaurant, a former military guy sits at my table without asking, mind you, I grew up around military people and never once had anything remotely of this calibre happen to me...I tell him I just came to eat alone and if he'd mind not sitting down with me. He threw the chair a few feet, slammed it back and left the table. 8) I was seated with a colleague who invited me out with his friends. Halfway through dinner, the question of what to do came up for after dinner. When I ran down a list and mentioned karaoke, one of his friends said this, "Us white people, we Caucasians don't like karaoke, we don't do that!" My colleague never breathed anything to me during or after, or while at work. I asked him later why not, he still didn't know what to say. It was the worst stunner I had as it was within the first few months of moving there for college. I probably have a few more events, but you get the picture. I gave it 7 years, with 3 being after college. I couldn't take it any longer, when the last straw was with a different company and my stand in manager while our manager was out of town yelled at me to "SIT DOWN" when I was tired of her yelling at me and I had to stand up to leave and quit. I had enough of this that racist town, I married a Caucasian, I have a half-Chinese/half-Caucasian step son, and I now live in what turned out to be another very white community, but with no racist remarks whatsoever. Must be because I am up North! Thank God for that!
Keeley | Cambridge, MA