Worst Experience Ever

Being in a Latin American country, especially Argentina, it is to be expected that one would experience awkward racial encounters at best or outright racism at worst. Last weekend I had an encounter that was somewhere in between.

Last Saturday I had to work at the co-op that my internship, Amigos de la Tierra, is a part of to help package and sell their artesanal goods. They hold a feria all day so we were meeting up at the office at around 9am to go help set up. I was the first one to arrive at the office so I was waiting outside in the cold with my jeans, scarf, and coat on. As I'm waiting, a young man walks by me, and we made what I thought to be meaningless, brief eye contact. But after making said eye contact he stopped and asks me:

 "estas trabajando?" (are you working?)

Thinking he may be volunteering with us I answered:

"si." (yes)

But then he proceeded to ask me:

"cuanto?" (how much.)

Confused, I responded:

"cuanto es que?" (how much is what?)

To this he looked at me side eyed and stated:

"por el sexo." (for sex)

Needless to say, I was mortified. This random man had assumed I was a prostitute looking for work in broad daylight while fully dressed. I couldn't even respond in Spanish. All I could utter were repeated "no's" until he got the message and walked away.

Before coming to Argentina, I had read about Black women being mistaken for prostitutes, but I hadn't thought about it again until it happened to me. Thankfully it wasn't at night time or on a smaller street because who knows what he could have done.

Again, I've been reminded of the consequences of my identity as a Black woman that follow me wherever I go and affect my experiences regardless of how carefree I try to be. But to be clear, I didn't write this post to dissuade Black women from traveling to Argentina because it's important that we experience the world and that the world experiences us, but as a reminder to always be aware of your surroundings and to understand the context in which your environment operates.

Until next time,

Alexis