Black History Month in Uganda

In Uganda, every month is BHM…or just, history.

In my time here, and in my growing friendships with Ugandans, I've found something to be true that is honestly just sad.

When I am friends with someone here, I am considered the exception. Not from other white people who live here, but from my country.

I think sometimes we think the U.S. is living in a vacuum, that our issues only touch us. But every time a young black man is shot without cause, every time a march is held in favor of white nationalism, every time someone in power says something derogatory about African Americans or African American nations-the world is listening. And when the most powerful nation on the planet says something about you, sometimes you believe it.

I realized this late one night over drinks when a few of my friends here who love to talk American politics were getting into it. It's normally fun to go back and forth, to learn about the different worlds in which we come, and how they impact each other, to argue with the boys. But this night was different. There was a sense of sadness from what they had seen. A resignation that the current US political climate truly meant, in a sense, no one was coming for them. No one was thinking about them.

Just because they are strong doesn't constitute ignorance on our part.

Reading this you may think that's a crazy idea to begin with, that of course, we have nothing to do with Uganda and so on. But don't dismiss the fact that the culture we (the U.S.) create in more ways than one informs the culture of the world. The way our country treats race relations is playing in more living rooms than the other way around.

To be fair, there may not be much you as a reader can do about this. But I think there is more to do than you think.

In the last week of Black History Month, I know you can do more. To that you may respond, the black people around me don't feel like that, they know I'm not bad/racist-they aren't upset, etc. etc. etc.

I may not know everything, but I know this:

Just because our black brothers and sisters aren't wearing their wounds on their sleeves, doesn't mean they don't feel them. Just because they are strong doesn't constitute ignorance on our part. It does mean we should take more time to learn, to ask, and to listen.

The history of black and white in America is a painful, ugly, up from the ashes your neighbor set flame to one, and there is no reason any white person should not be acknowledging and seeking to understand that this month with reverence, and a desire to recompense it.

Sitting in a group of my Uganda friends, I don't want to be known as the "exception" for white people because my actions aren't something they've seen anywhere else. Maybe you can't do anything about that, but maybe you can-especially with the people around you.

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"We have heard stories about white men who made the powerful guns and the strong drinks and took slaves away across the seas, but no one thought the stories were true."

- Chinua Achebe, Things Fall Apart