Winning Words: Heinz 57, Maybe?

MANY BARBADIANS consider me white.  At CBC, the late Terry Mayers said no matter what I do or how I think and feel I’ll always be treated as white.  This was in no way a bad thing, he was putting a name to a mindset I was already aware of!  Like me, he knew I was anything but.  I’m more mixed than Heinz 57: African-Danish-Italian-Carib-Portuguese-Scots, etc.  I said to him my mother’s birth certificate says she is Coloured.

Yet even on my first day of training to present news on TV, I had a floor crew member look at me and say he “don’t want no stinking red man” reading his news.  Ironically, in 2005 when I was leaving, it was the same floor crew member who asked why I’m leaving and if I’m sure I want to go.  Rather like the reverse of Men of Honor with Cuba Gooding, Jr.

My wife is a dark, full-figured woman.  When I sought to introduce her to white Bajan acquaintances?  Only one or two actually spoke and exchanged so-called pleasantries.

When I was engaged and I introduced her to one prominent hardware store owner, he openly ignored my wife.  I said to her if she buys a screw or nail from across the road from where we lived I’d divorce her, even though I adored her.

My friends at CBC and my friends while at Sanitation remain, but all my white Bajan acquaintances have evaporated like dew at noon.

People who I know that are white and Bajan may be offended in seeing this, but answer me now—honestly?  Have I ever had a rum or chewed a ham-cutter at your place, and if I invited you to come by at me for Christmas, have you?

Don’t get me wrong!  My life is none the poorer.  I salute the BLM movement.  But I’m 54, and I have no wish to learn if my lungs would be flooded with mucus from COVID-19.

Nevertheless, anyone who says racism is not here in Barbados is a liar. And when ignorance like this occurs, is it any surprise to learn such racism is reciprocal?