Travelling Abroad as a Black Woman
Studying abroad has been my dream ever since I was a child. My Mother was blessed with the opportunity to study abroad in London in college, and per usual, I wanted to follow in her footsteps. Blood, sweat, and tears went into the process of making it happen, and it took 6 years of hard work. My persistence and diligence in high school landed me a full ride to American University in Washington DC. With my scholarships, I have been able to stud abroad free of cost, something that I am so grateful for. Two of my college best friends and I have been planning to study abroad together since freshman year. We are all women of color who have grinded to successfully study abroad together in no other than Africa, the motherland, in the country of Morocco. We spent late evenings and early mornings working in our University’s call center, googling pictures of Moroccan beaches, and flights to Paris and Barcelona All while soliciting donations from alumni, putting money in our pockets with the hopes that we would be spending that money made on essential oils and elaborate cloth paintings in the motherland. Fast-forward, after I worked 5 jobs in 2019, it’s 2020, and we are quite literally living the dream we manifested.
Last semester, before coming to Morocco, I was granted the opportunity to spend the semester in Rome, Italy. And let say my experience was very… interesting. I truly couldn’t be more grateful for the opportunity to study in such a beautiful country, but my overall experience was hindered by obstacles I didn’t expect to face. The most prominent one: racism. I had often heard that Italians are such loving, warm people, who are not racist and welcome black people with open arms. I even experienced it firsthand as two of my closest friends are Italian, and they and their families always treated me so well. So I was quite shocked upon my arrival in Italy, being faced with racism on the daily. I was spit on, sexually assaulted, twice, physically assaulted, denied medical care, pushed, stared at by just about everyone on the street with an unwelcoming glare. I mostly felt this in Rome, not in the rest of the cities within the country. And of course, even in Rome, not everyone was like this of course. Many Italians welcomed me with open arms and I made good friends with a couple. But it was always half ad half. Sometimes I would walk into an establishment and be joyfully embraced, other times I would be given the cold shoulder and as I mentioned before, sometimes I would even be refused service. What I came to understand is that Italians are indeed not racist… to tourists. But the minute you’re living amongst them and they feel as if our a potential taint to their Italian culture, the racism bleeds out. This made day-to-day life quite rough. The moment I walked out of my apartment door, I immediately felt like I wasn’t wanted and I didn’t belong. It was a complete contrast from my experience now in Morocco, where the Moroccans welcome me with such open arms.
Despite the extreme racism, my overall experience in Italy was truly transformative. I traveled across the entire country, and also traveled within Europe to Malta, London and Amsterdam. Italy is such a beautiful country from Milan, to Tuscany to the Amalfi Coast, there are so many incredible sights to see. When traveling within Italy, the racism I experienced was present but not nearly as extreme as what I felt in Rome. I received much fewer stares and much more kindness. Outside of Italy, in my travels to London, Malta, and Amsterdam, I was welcomed in all three places with open arms. London and Amsterdam are both extremely diverse and I didn’t feel like an outsider as I did in Rome. Malta, a country still recovering from World War Two, has an extremely humble population, and astonishing views. It was kind of diverse but nobody stared or judged, they minded their own business and enjoyed the stunning scenery and beautiful weather.
Overall as a Black woman, my travels within Europe went much better than I expected. Black and Brown migration in many European countries is a newer occurrence so there is no institutionalized racism, instead, racism is transparent, blatant and sometimes violent. Studying abroad in Africa has definitely been a much better experience and I recommend Africa over Europe if you are planning to study abroad. It’s so refreshing to live amongst an entire population of black and brown people and not fear racial discrimination. Sure, I hear the usual “chocolate goddess” catcalls, but nothing much outside of this. Studying abroad in general, however, is such a transformative experience that I highly recommend for all Black women.
