How can non-Caucasians avoid suspicious looks when traveling in the West?

Namaste!

In my experience, and my opinion, behaving in a friendly and respectful AND assertive manner goes a long way.

I am a what people would call a “white South African”, and have travelled in Turkey, Greece, Egypt and Indonesia, to name a few. In spite of dressing modestly (long skirts, arms completely covered and hair covered) I was constantly physically harrased when in Turkey, and definitely stared at everywhere I travelled, so I can empathise with your dilema. The perception of many people is that all western women are loose, or sexually available, and easy. I had to stand up for myself or be abused.

Now I realise that we are talking about separate issues here, but the bottom line is that most people are ignorant. I found out that by talking to people, telling them about my beliefs and showing my individuality, let them see that they could not put me in a box with all their other generalisations. They began to respect me once they knew where I was coming from. If you see someone staring at you, give them a friendly hello and take it from there. On the other hand, do not put up with any harrasment.

Not all of us in the west are ignorant and predjudiced. There are some spiritual and non judgemental people here too.

I wish you joyous and pleasant travelling experiences, and maybe you would like to visit Cape Town someday.

(By the way, I also had to convince a lot of people that not all white South Africans are racist, we are usually automatically branded that way!)

I am from a super minority and travel 4 times a month and based on my experience:

1 – First look clean and healthy (no red/yellow eyes)

2 – Pack clean and feel free to use the post office to send over things that could irritate the custom officer

3 – Prepare your documents and fill all forms before getting to the counter

4 – Look at your passport as he/she checks it (do not look at them in the eyes – few will know that)

5 – Travel light is a standard.

While a different type of attention, as a blond Caucasian people would stare when I was walking around South America, and point, and you’d hear “gringo, gringo” and often some choice words after that. A few cheery words back in my awful Spanish would get a laugh and they’d carry on as per normal.

I had a friend who was of Sri Lankan descent, who grew a beard in London. We came back from Norway once, and left him alone for a minute in the airport. As he stood there, two policemen immediately came up and started questioning him, and did a background check. Once that was done they were all friendly, and it could be random, but it made you wonder.

When it comes down to it, we all have our prejudices, warranted or not, big or small. And we have to realise that so do other people. We judge on appearance, on name, on voice, on what they’re wearing. And it’s stupid, yes, but this is how we have survived for millenia – by making snap judgements. It’s a built in thing.

Of course, in today’s modern society, we have the freedom to self-evaluate and realise that these are often unfounded. Partly it’s the media’s fault, partly stereotypes. Unfortunately, not everyone does this, or may not do it at first.

As such, you have two options. The first option is to just accept it and ignore it. I got used to being stared at, and had fun with it – wave at people, walk up to those making comments and use them to ask for directions or whatever. Diffuse things.

The second option is to try and reduce the differences between you and them. This puts people at ease. Just saying hello and having them hear a friendly voice helps. If you are ok doing so, dressing more like the locals to fit in. With people being scared on a helicopter ride, ask where they’re from etc, and maybe take a photo with them early on to show that you’re also just another excited tourist.

Something I’ve found is that the more travelled backpackers – often (but not always) – tend to be more familiar, easier at making friends – mainly because they’ve realised people everywhere are just that – people, for the most part trying to live a happy life with friends and family.

Of course there are a small few who are narrow-minded enough that you won’t be able to change them. Be friendly towards them anyway, but accept that it’s not necessarily worth the effort, and some will always be hostile or suspicious.

I can’t say that I completely understand your situation (I am, after all, of European descent), but you should not be surprised to find out that

Some people are stupid have prejudices

I have indeed been treated sometimes differently for being Eastern European (and proud of it!), and the thing that I found works best is to just ignore them and pretend that you don’t know what they are doing. Acting in a way that reinforces their stereotypes won’t help, neither is being defensive, so be very polite (the more annoying they are, the more polite you should be) with the people you meet and try to “behave like them” in certain situations.

In 99% of the time, the prejudices stem from the fact that they have never (or rarely) seen a people of your ethnic descent in vivo, and all their opinions towards members of certain ethnic groups come from mass media and other prejudiced people.

All being said,here are some things that might help:

• Appearance. While people of ethnic origin other than European are common for many European countries, clothing style is pretty much uniform all over Europe. Traditional clothing is virtually not seen, and wearing it would definitely cause more raised eyebrows than it would otherwise. Please note that I’m not trying to denigrate the clothing style of a particular culture, but the train of thought of many people goes along the lines of looks different->is different->is unknown->I don't like them.

• Behaviour. Be polite with people, even if they are annoying jingoistic pricks. Smile at them when making inadvertent eye contact.

  • Don’t try to start an argument with them that you are a normal guy and just because you look or are named in a particular way doesn’t mean you behave like that. Don’t answer back. You are not going to win this one. Best tactics is to smile and ignore them, even if you are right. Especially when you are right.
  • Ignore their suspicious look and hushed remarks aimed at you — take the moral high ground and pretend these things don’t affect you.
  • Certain religious practices tend to alarm ignorant people, so avoid conducting them in the presence of others if possible.

• Language. If you are in the presence of people that don’t know your language, try not to use it when you are talking to your friend and other people are also part of the discussion. I always switch automatically to English in such situations, even if the people that don’t understand the language are a minority. This shows consideration to the others and demonstrates you don’t have second thoughts and are not talking behind their backs. Of course, if it’s only you and your friend, you can talk in any language you like, but as soon as another people join the conversation, it’s common courtesy to switch to English (or other language common for the group you are in). Of course, other people should be doing exactly the same when you are in your presence, but sadly this won’t happen nearly as often.

And now, some of my favourite personal examples of overturned stereotypes: I have a friend of Iraqi descent who is a fervent Catholic, has been to Jerusalem more than a few times and goes to church regularly. At the same time, another friend of mine of Bosnian descent is a Muslim, although you can never tell from the way he looks and behaves. And finally, yet another of my friends from Ethiopia made a furor at a certain defense contractor company when he appeared with dreadlocks and baggy pants on a project presentation, and proceeded to blow their minds with his competence. They were utterly confused and later my friend told me that this was one of the most satisfying moments of his life.

I’d like to preface this with saying that I don’t agree with the prejudice but I acknowledge the fact that it exists and with that painful point in mind here are my thoughts and advice.

The bad news is without actual interaction, it’s really hard to change somebody’s silent prejudice. To put people at ease around you that you are not going to actually speak to, it helps to reduce cultural differences. To get fewer looks in America, dress the way a responsible American of your age would and learn some of the local customs. As a warning, don’t dress as a caricature of your target culture. Your goal should be to blend more then anything.

For somebody sitting next to you, strike up a conversation and find some common ground. Be sensitive to the fact that they may just not want to talk at all. Personally I don’t mind small talk but on a long flight I prefer the movie.

Humans are naturally suspicious of things that are different. Your goal is to reduce the perceived differences to a degree that triggers the behavior from strangers that is tolerable to you. The longer you’re going to interact with them the more effort you will need to put into building a connection. This will work about 80% of the time. The other 20% would probably require too much work for it to be worth your energy.