A group of skinheads screaming "These are 'white' seats!" at two female African bus passengers while all the other white passengers keep staring out of the windows as if nothing is happening.
A black guy turns up to look at a flat that's been advertised for rent, but as soon as the door opens and the owner sees he's African it's ,"Oh, you're too late." But, mysteriously, the flat remains available for rent.
An African man is sitting in a tram when suddenly there's a bang on the window; he looks up to see a white guy on the platform flipping him the finger and telling him to go back to where he came from.
These aren't incidents from the 60s, but from modern day Germany, and if you speak to African immigrants anywhere in Europe you will hear of similar incidents. Actually, speak to almost anyone who's not white and they'll have a story, which could be anything from being stopped an unusual number of times by the police to incidents like the ones in this undercover video report on racism in multicultural Britain.
The internet may have given us all so many more windows on the world, but the extent of racism and discrimination against Africans in Europe still isn't something most Africans are aware of until they arrive in their destination country. How could they be? It's not part of the mainstream diet of news or entertainment in Lagos, Dakar or Nairobi, so if you want to know about it you have to search for it. Neither is it much a part of the stories that make it back home from those who've already settled in Europe, so you don't search for it because you don't know it's something you should be aware of. Besides, it probably wouldn't make any difference to anyone intent on moving to Europe anyway. Still, overt racism is one of the bigger shocks for new arrivals in Europe, the first time they encounter it. They get an even bigger shock the first time they get some race-related aggro from a West Indian, but that's another, sadder story).
Of course, most Europeans aren't overtly racist, and overt racism is only half the story. A skinhead telling you to go the fuck back to where you came from denies you the freedom to feel free, but it's the covert racists who will deny you the opportunities to get a place to rent or a job (see 'Undercover job hunters reveal huge race bias in Britain's workplaces').
On the other hand, the covert racists probably won't take your life, which is what happened to Alberto Adriano, a Mozambican father of three who was brutally murdered in 2000 by skinheads in Dessau, Germany. This was just one of the 140 racially-motivated murders that had happened in Germany since 1989, and it prompted Nigerian-German artist Adé Bantu to set up the music collective Brothers Keepers to bring some attention to an issue that doesn't get anywhere near enough of it. In honour of Alberto Adriano they recorded the track The Final Warning
From time to time you hear about similar incidents (in Russia, Sweden, etc.), and, though the pressures of globalisation make people everywhere feel more unsecure and thus increase the likelihood of scapegoating, extreme racism and discrimination exist even in the good times.
What is it the racists are afraid of or angry about? Change? That if "outsiders" are absorbed society will be altered in ways they do not recognise? That it will become too multi-cultural? But culture and society are never static, and Europeans have never worried about what effect they might have on a local culture and society when they have migrated to other parts of the world. Until the end of the second world war Europe was a continent of emigrants. Escaping hunger, financial crises, ethnic cleansing, war or totalitarian governments, millions left for North and Latin America. They arrived en masse without visas and without conditions imposed on them by authorities. And gradually they integrated into society. It was by no means smooth going, but the harsh rejection of today's African immigrants to Europe is a sign of deep hypocrisy and entitlement.
AFRICAN IN A WHITE WORLD
What does it feel like to be African in a white world? This is the question at the heart of this week's episode of Surprising Europe: Culture Shock, and the answer depends on who you ask. The hurdles that must be scaled to feel completely at home in Europe are different for Africans who were born in Europe, or moved to Europe at a very young age, than for those who move as adults. For the former there is, of course, no culture shock. You grew up in England, France, Germany, The Netherlands, etc. and that's your home, though you will be well aware of your roots - from the way your parents and their friends interact, the music you will have heard while growing up, the social gatherings you attended as families, etc.
You might have encountered some friction at school ("What kind of funny name is that?"), depending on how diverse the student body was at your school, but you end up taking your dual identity for granted. Which is why the question, "Yes, but where are you really from?" can be so baffling and annoying. It's a question that seems to suggest a desire on the part of the person doing the asking to keep the races apart, and at its heart is, I fear, the notion of superiority ('You're not like us and you never will be.'). It might even indicate the sub-conscious desire to keep Europe/the white race "pure" ('You're not one of us and you never will be.'), which, if true, is probably not dissimilar to what's going on in the mind of the violent skinhead. But the question is usually asked so politely.
It's also a question that, even if you're not asked it directly, you kind of sense in the air. Thus even Africans who were born in Europe and grew up with dual identities can sometimes find their sense of identity shaken. And then there's the issue of having a dual identity but coming to wonder if you really have the right to call yourself African as well if you've never actually been to Africa. Many European born and raised Africans will identify with French-Gabonese singer Wonda Wendy, who was born and raised in France, when she says during this week's episode that she felt whole only after she'd been to live in Gabon for 5 years. Her track Best of Both Sides is the result of this feeling of completeness, of finally feeling really at peace with her dual identity.
Best of Both Sides: download the mp3
LOVE ACROSS CULTURES
Senegalese-Dutch couple Moussé and Turid with their kids
But it's not all doom and gloom. Most African immigrants, like immigrants of all stripes everywhere, do, eventually, find their place. This week's episode of Surprising Europe also includes a feature on mixed couples, with a focus on one particular couple, Moussé (Senegalese) and Turid (Dutch), who met in Senegal but now live with their children in the Netherlands. This segment highlights the little day-to-day adaptations Africans who move to Europe as adults have to make. Turid and Moussé talk about the difference in pace and different attitudes to time.
Moussé's cruising speed and attitude to time is akin to that of Southern Europeans, but for the Dutch, like the Germans, English, French and other Northern Europeans, time is to be used efficiently, which means the scheduling of activity and the allocation of time. Fortunately for Moussé, he found a way to fit his relaxed tempo to the demands of a faster-paced society without having to change who he is. It's the difference between integration (which leaves room for you to retain parts of your African identity) and assimilation (which demands that you relinquish all of it), and key to finding your comfort zone in a different culture. A lot of what we've been hearing recently from politicians in Europe since it swung to the right sounds very much like the desire for assimilation, but we'll talk about that in another article.
Some cuktural surprises, habits and customs are a source of great laughs, the cold, the habit of jumping into the freezing North Sea on New Year's Day, or the need to make appointments to see friends (as opposed to just dropping by unannounced). Comrade, a Nigerian in the Netherlands, writes about inadvertently putting his legs to sleep when he tried to copy the European habit of sitting with their legs crossed. Other things remain baffling even for European-born Africans. Wonda Wendy, for instance, says "You're so alone that you have to pay somebody to look after your baby while you're working." Europeans look at Africa and think the men don't care about their kids, and Africans look at Europe and can't understand how a society can be so atomised.
