Black and back in Shitstanbul

-
The average individual for whatever misinformed reasons is under the delusion that blacks and whites are routinely treated equally on a daily basis.

By average individual I mean white person. Any black person who thinks likewise is clearly either a United States Supreme Court Justice or coked and/or %#@! out of his mind. Maybe both. The prevailing conventional wisdom regards racial discrimination a thing of the past; something to be nicely bracketed with two paragraphs in junior high civics textbooks (one paragraph more than the obligatory mention of the "peculiar Institution").

As a black man I am reminded full well of the persistence of racism.In America and abroad

People like to put all the baggage on America because of its wealth, capitalism, and abundance of self-made men - scientists, engineers, millionaires, world famous entertainers - as if no other country traded slaves or instituted segregation - de facto or otherwise - just because their particular country is probably divided betwixt the mafia, the military, the sheep herder.

I've travelled beyond the continental borders of the U.S.A. and damn if foreign folk aren't color conscious. I'll call it what it is: bigoted. In Puerto Rico it's thick enough to slice with a knife. In Mexico it's as noxious as the instilled corruption. In entrenched in the Argentine psyche while in Turkey racism rears its ugly head with a smile and leering stare.

In Istanbul the Turkish people, without fail, fail to realize that not all black people are Africans. This fact befuddles them. Then again this is a city which lives in the past while fronting as a hip, modern metropolis. Schizophrenia, anyone? 

Up to this point I've made greater use of black than African-American, partly out of preference but more so to drive home this point: Turks regard "African-American" quixotic, a term of contradictions. How can one, their Muslim heads wonder, be black ("African") and American? As everyone in Istanbul knows, all Americans are big, fat white infidels...who leave super generous tips.

News flash sinbads: Black people also come from other continents and countries on the face of the globe, including the United States of America. Hello!

Americans are big, fat white infidels...who leave super generous tips

Ignorance I can stomach from common, everyday folk who've grown to regard things like higher education, toothpaste, deodorant, and condoms as luxuries. However when this same bias is displayed by, say, government officials then I have a big problem; id est their stupidity directly affects me. Case in point: My extended stay in Istanbul. With some two weeks of mosques, döner kebabs, nationalist protests, hammams, and ubiquitous images of Mustafa Ataturk under my belt I was more than ready to leave this Muslim metropolis with good tidings. Then I was barred from doing so. I chose to travel via bus with Metro company. The ride was quite comfortable. At the Edirne (er-DEER-neh) passport inspection, however, my trip was halted. The passport police (plural) took one look at me (black face) and my passport (U.S.A.) and immediately concluded I was illegitimate. 

I was prohibited from re-boarding the bus and, instead, sent back to Shitstanbul

I have been to several countries and each time the officials scan or check on the passport with the computer, and if some doubt lingers they follow through with an advance database search or telephone call. The police at Edirne performed no such protocol. They only trusted their prejudices, insisting  

1. my passport was a fake 
2. I was a fake, i.e., NOT an American citizen 
3. I entered Shitstanbul by plane when in fact I travelled by rail and had the visa and round stamp to prove it 
4. I was up to no good in their country.

I was summarily prohibited from re-boarding the bus to continue my trip and, instead, sent back to Shitstanbul. And I was the only black person and American citizen on the bus. If this does not smack clear of racism, or somehow sounds remotely reasonable to you, then go kindly exfoliate your face with a salt encrusted barbed wire because you're an idiot who deserves to look as grotesquely as he reasons [sic].

Speaking of which, the only explanation the one dismally English speaking official could give was "Problem passport" and "We are professionals". And that is the scary part. Professional assholes, guided by racism and mean spirit, molested my trip and wasted my time and money.

So now I am back in Shitstanbul, holed up in a hostel in Sultanahmet, waiting for the American Consulate to return to "work" from holiday -- and still 100% black as African-American. And feeling blue as the rainy weather.