my adventures in hickville.-rr is getting too serious.

[returntosender]

So today I went for a highway test and because Toronto is reknown for it's impossibly high standards, we opted for an easier location. Our choice: Lindsay. Population: no idea. I'm guessing a few tens of thousands.

Our departure from Toronto started at 5 am, and when we get within the Lindsay city limits it's about 7 am. My driving instructor stops by a Tim Hortons where the 4 of us, me, an Indian guy, and the two tibetans(one of them is my instructor) get out to stretch our legs and buy coffee. Right away I noticed a line of pickup trucks parked near the entrance to the parking lot. One of hte trucks had the slogan 'Rednecks and proud of it!' in the front windshield.

As we're drinking our coffee and making conversation, a few laughs can be heard in not too far distance. A car pulls up, and out comes these 4 white people-and as they walk by us, I notice the woman(presumably the wife)said out loud to the guy(probably her husband) to 'Not say a damn word, not a damn word' just as they walked passed us. So, picture this, 4 asians standing in the middle of a Tim Hortons parking lot, surrounded by tons and tons of white people. Scary stuff. When my instructor decides it's time to go, I've never been more relieved.

On our way, it seemed like every pedestrian and driver was staring into our car. I can't say for sure if it was just happenstance or if they really were just curious. Couldn't help but feel like an endangered species in some exclusive zoo exhibit. Still, there are no signs of minorities in the whole town. Every single soul we saw were white.

When we get to the testing centre, our instructor starts giving each guy a preparatory lesson. After the first guy finished his lesson, the second guy took the weel while the others moved around to an empty seat. During the last 15 minutes of the second guys lesson, I spotted a black chick! I couldn't believe it. She was the first sign of diversity in the whole town. Somehow, somewhere, I reasoned, there must be more of her kind withint the city. Alas, we drove around some more without seeing another minority.

The first guy was taking his test now, and the other guy had wandered off somewhere, while my instructor and I went looking around. When we made our way towards the entrance of the mall, several white people were in front smoking. They stared at us the whole time until we disappeared inside. As we made our way across the mall, a couple of ladies just blurted out 'What are you looking for, a date??'. There was just us and the ladies and like 2 other white people in the area. I turned around quickly to find that yeah-it was just us. Okay. Now I'm starting to get worried.

So we're outside of the mall on the other side, and this oldish white lady is approaching the entrance. My instructor asked her politely, if she knew where the Canadian Tire (sorta like Canada's version of Walmart) was. Just as he was finished asking, I could see that she cluthed her carry bag very tightly close to her chest. My instructor just froze, obviously seeing what I just saw, before once again asking her. She finally pointed us in the right direction. We had a good laugh as we walked towards the Canadian Tire.

Inside, once again, nothing but white people. My instructor asked one of the floor persons, a woman, where he could find some lights. She was very polite and answered our questions. We walked around some more before deciding that it was time to leave. Coincidentally, the lady who was helping us earlier saw us coming and made this nasty expression on her face. Not sure if my instructor saw it, but it gave me the chills.

Finally, we arrived at testing centre and by now there seemed to have gathered a group of Asians who came to Lindsay for the same reasons as us. I took my test and passed. So did the guys that I was with.

Overall, I did see 'one' minority mingling with the whites-it was some asian chick who was with a white family. But it was one of the scariest experiences I've had in a long time. I'm just glad that I'll never have to go there again. I can't imagine a family having to start life in one of these places. But there are. I know some of them. I hope their experiences are better than mine.

[TB4000]

^Welcome to the world outside of the big city. That's pretty much how most small towns are. My sister's car broke down on her way back to Indianapolis, and there's nothing down there but corn and little buttfuck type cities.

[returntosender]

yeah, i'm sadly aware of that. one time my friends and i, all blacks, were driving to the national capital city of Canada and we stopped by a town called 'belleville' that is similar to Lindsay. Needless to say, I don't think it would be outside the realm of reality that a fight could have happened between our group and the white folks.

[eos]

my sister told me about an incident where a group of very diverse students were in the south for some kind of conference and they were outside a restaurant, just standing around, not causing any trouble. a lady comes on the speaker and says,"to the group of minorities in the parking lot, please do not loiter here." wtf???

[Tao]

i can relate. my parents and i were going to visit cape cod a few years back, and on our way there, we stopped by a mcdonalds. and ppl just kept on staring at us...it was the wierdest most uncomfortable shit i've ever experienced. i was thinking to myself wow...never leaving nyc again!

[CBC guy]

Hey one of my profs from last year (when I went to Ottawa for a semester) comes from Belleville. (but he lives in Ottawa now)

[Chad]

Originally Posted by returntosender

As we made our way across the mall, a couple of ladies just blurted out 'What are you looking for, a date??'.

haha man that's an awesome set up for "yeah, but i dont want no two-dollar whore with burning goddamn gonorrhea"
if you live in hickville for a while you kind of learn how to make fun of people who try to harass you but most important to avoid the police at all costs even if you aren't doing anything illegal.
just remember to talk in the most ridiculous fake hick accent back to those pieces of trash so they know that you know the score.

[SunWuKong]

being the nation's capital, DC gets all kinds of tourists that are of the "All American" type. having said that, i've even had tourist white kids on the DC metro trains stare at me like i'm the first Asian guy they've ever seen. and this is in DC, hahhah.

[thaite]

Ugh!

There aren't a lot of Asians where I live, but at least there are enough brown skins that people don't look twice.

[Hiroshi2]

This sounds similar to the experience we had when we went to visit my mother's cousin down in the country.


My mother's cousin married a white man. My mother married a black man. All of us are walking around the small town of Sunny South, Alabama. In a group. Talking and walking with each other. Can you imagine the stares???


Sunny South is a little small town in Wilcox County, Alabama, which once was home to many large plantations. There's two streets in town, and only one traffic light. The main road leading into town (which ironically enough leads all the way back to Birmingham) is extremely narrow with barely enough room for two cars to pass each other. I do believe it's what most people think of when they think of "Alabama".


Down in the part of Alabama, there are small communites of minorities (not just blacks but other minorities) but they often have their own town. For example, in the same area as Sunny South, there's a town called "Vashti" where all the Indian people live. There's another town called "Buena Vista" that's all Hispanic. And quite a few Vietnamese people. The county as a whole is majority black, with a few towns that are all white where blacks just don't go.


No surprise to hear about your experience. When traveling with the family on road trips with my mother, we experienced similar dirty looks and mean mugs in Tupelo, Mississippi and Florence, South Carolina.


Even Birmingham is not as bad as any of these little podunk places.

[TB4000]

As much as we claim to get disrespect in the south, our people sure as hell have no prob still living down there, do we? Basically, we're not gonna let them run us out.

[smorgasbord]

Originally Posted by Hiroshi2

Down in the part of Alabama, there are small communites of minorities (not just blacks but other minorities) but they often have their own town. For example, in the same area as Sunny South, there's a town called "Vashti" where all the Indian people live. There's another town called "Buena Vista" that's all Hispanic. And quite a few Vietnamese people. The county as a whole is majority black, with a few towns that are all white where blacks just don't go.

Here's something interesting: there's a continuous strip of more than 600 majority (or near majority) Black counties in the South. According to some political thinkers, like the Mao-reading civil-rights leader James Forman (who passed away last year), the area is the national territory of the Black Nation.

The southern Black Belt:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Belt_(U.S._region)

[Hiroshi2]

I don't know about all that Black Nation crap. The towns in the South that are black have been black for decades, perhaps for a century or more.


Trust me, nobody put that much thought into building "black" towns. Those towns are just that way because the whites wouldn't let blacks settle in their communities. Simple as that. There was no Marcus Garvey, let's-build-our-own-black-nation shit going on down here, they did not put that much thought into it.

As much as we claim to get disrespect in the south, our people sure as hell have no prob still living down there, do we? Basically, we're not gonna let them run us out.

Probably because they realized that racism existed up north just as much as it does down south. It kinda burst their bubble, I guess. If you have ever read the book Black Boy by Richard Wright you know what i mean. You really have to read the newer edition (well the "newer" edition came out in like 1940, but whatever). In the second edition he adds on a Part II where he talks about his life in Chicago, since the original "Black Boy" only talks about his life before he moved up north. I know the book takes place back in the late 1920s but the same basic principles apply. Black people thought that the north was a promised land only to be woefully dissappointed.


So I say if you're gonna take shit from whitey, you might as well do it in nice, warm weather



Oh and btw, heads up to any minorites who might be reading this - the real, true hardcore white supremacist, skinhead motherfuckers have left the south, for the most part. They have all moved to places like Idaho, Montana, etc. where there really aren't any black people. This is why the KKK no longer rallies in downtown Birmingham (though I certainly remember the days when they did) or Memphis or anywhere else in the South. They ran into legal troubles in Mobile, which chased them out of Alabama. Then they decided to leave the South altogether, too many blacks. And now they're out west in the states that I just mentioned.


If y'all think the south is bad for minorities (and for the record, I've heard more than one black person say that Alabama is a lot less racist than Chicago), then go out somewhere in the west like ID or MT where there's no minorites, except for Indians. And we all know how much rednecks love Indians (or Injuns as they say).

Originally Posted by smorgasbord

Here's something interesting: there's a continuous strip of more than 600 majority (or near majority) Black counties in the South. According to some political thinkers, like the Mao-reading civil-rights leader James Forman (who passed away last year), the area is the national territory of the Black Nation.

The southern Black Belt:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Belt_(U.S._region)

Yes I know about the Black Belt, i live in the 7th congressional district of AL which includes that area. It is the only majority black congressional district in the state. It includes not just majority black counties in South Alabama that are just as blue as any New England or West Coast state but also most of inner-city Birmingham, which of course is also heavily black and heavily Democratic.

[eos]

why does everyone say that chicago is the most racist city, and that we're all backwards hicks??? people say its cuz every race has its own neighborhood, but isn't it like that in other major cities also? it hurts when people bash my city.

[TB4000]

^Who bashes it? They just get on us because we're in the midwest and not on the east or west coast. I held the door open for two guys that were visiting our office from Silicon Valley earlier today and they remarked, "people from Chicago are so polite and nice, must be that midwest thing."