WHO the heck am I anyway?

As I was doing homework, I suddenly realized: you have no idea who I am, do you? And I figured I would fix that, and tell you a bit about me, and about how I ended up halfway across the world, from Dakar to Paris to SF. I hate doing homework anyway.

Sooooo. I was born and raised in Senegal, a small, beautiful country on the West Coast of Africa; I loved living there. I used to go to France to visit family every holiday, but I was always eager to go home. We lived in a house about five minutes away from the beaches (because they were a lot of beaches – we were right on the coast); the perfect place. Today, the Almadies neighborhood is the city’s posh, kinda snoby neighborhood, full of expensive nightclubs and fancy restaurants. But twenty years ago, my father was the first – yes, the very first – to ever build a house there; we owned the only house within miles. A few years later, other families settled next to our home. They were almost all white families. It was interesting to be the only black family around in our own country. My best friend was a blond girl with blue eyes – Tania; we were always together until she went back to France. Life in Senegal is easy with its year-long summer weather, and people are welcoming. Mind you, Senegal was actually awarded 6^th most welcoming country in the world! So when my parents announced that we were moving to France after I finished high school, I cried for 15 minutes, at least. Now, I know what you think. Poor Brigitte is moving to Paris, how sad! Well, yes, I was sad. I was going to leave my high school friends behind, my house, my ROOM. I didn’t want that. And I don’t even see why people love Paris so much...Don’t get me wrong! It is beautiful, it is the capital of Fashion, and I do have fun there. But when you’ve lived in Africa for your whole childhood, you do not want to leave. In my case though, the sadness didn’t last. I had another objective. The U.S.A; better yet: California.

See, I am one of these people who, as a teenager, saw America through the media and especially channels such as MTV, with its reality shows (The Hills or Laguna Beach). I was a fervent viewer back in Senegal, and it didn’t change when I moved to Paris. I practically learned English with these shows. I know. As lame as it sounds, through them, I saw California as the dream land where everything was possible – even the impossible. I was already seeing myself as a rich and famous it-girl walking down Rodeo Drive with a dozen shopping bags and high heels, followed by paparazzi. I am just kidding…a little. Of course, my life here has nothing to do with all of that. It doesn’t mean that I stopped dreaming about it. I went to a French-American business school in Paris; they were offering an exchange program in San Francisco, and now, I am here. Let’s say my dreams are now more realistic: at the airport, the hard reality hit me right in the face. I was no celebrity, no it-girl. I didn’t need to hear (or understand the unsaid) that I looked so suspect that they had to put me in a separate line and look at my things. Why? I don’t want to know. I did realize that after 9/11, it would be difficult being in a US airport as a stranger, but this much? I felt immediately unwanted, and my feet began touching the ground again. In other words, I woke up.

The hassle to find a place to live was the second obstacle to my future-fabulous-and-happy life – if we want to stay optimistic. I went places that made me question my faith in humanity. Some people actually try to rent places that could only be good for rats. It’s my faith in God, however, that was reinforced when I found the perfect room completely out of the blue. Someone must’ve been looking after me: a girl from SF State was leaving the room she was renting near the campus, and posted a picture of the house on Facebook. I wasn’t the first to see the post, but I was surely the first to pick up my phone, because I got the room five minutes before another girl called. Talk about luck: the house was well decorated, the bathrooms were clean, and the bedroom quint and cozy. I didn’t even want to think about it; I just knew I was going to be happy there. I snapped a ton of pictures and sent them to my parents. They were just as happy as me. I had been in San Francisco for only three days. I paid for my room and spent my first night out of Mom and Dad’s house. I thought I was prepared for that moment; I thought I would be scared in a way, and excited in another. I was actually very sad. I missed them terribly.

A couple of days after I moved to my student room, Orientation Week started at the university. It was supposed to be a way of welcoming students, and it was, but I don’t think it worked out as well as I would have wanted. There were house parties and trips planned by the Exchange program committee, but at the end of each day, I still felt like I was out of place. I didn’t share the love of partying and drinking alcohol all night. I didn’t like to “get wasted”. I was the only African girl, and whether or not that mattered, I was feeling lonely. That was when I met my boyfriend (yaay). He was nice and handsome with his thick brown curls which turned red under the sunlight; bright blue eyes shaped in a way that made him look always tired. That day, he was wearing a beige cardigan and blue jeans, and was carrying a (completely busted) black backpack – that I wish he could get rid of now. He was very handsome, but that’s not why I fell for him. I fell for him because he had the courage to come and introduce himself, out of the blue, at the bus stop. Who does that? I thought it was funny and interesting. Of course it wasn’t the first time a guy came up to me; every girl gets that. But it felt good, for once, not to be whistled at, or not to be called “Sexy”, “Mami”, and other petty ways to show interest in a woman. We spoke for a while and he eventually asked for my number. I wanted to say no. In my country, a girl cannot give up her number like that. We don’t do this. We like men to court us, to keep running for a while, before we even accept to talk to them. It always sounded ridiculous to me, but at that moment, I realized that my first thought was: Wait, he can’t have your number just like that. You don’t even know him. What would Mom say? Before my mind could put its veto on the matter, I heard myself say “Oh sure! Here, 415…” I was angry at myself. Afterwards, everything happened fast. What was I thinking, you ask? I wish I knew. I was only going to be here for 6 months. What’s going to happen after that? I thought. I was only going to suffer and make someone else suffer…unless I stayed. I am now here for another two years.

Don’t get me wrong, I am graduating in two years; that is why I am staying in the first place. But a new relationship makes you decide faster, makes things more dangerous, complicated, and beautiful as well. I left everything I knew and loved, and it may or may not be the biggest mistake of my life: I fell in the trap of loveeeeee and affection (Holla Riri! Holla Future!). However, though I was afraid to be hurt, San Francisco is the kind of city that makes you see new opportunities over time. There are so many things to see and discover that I know I'll be okay no matter what happens.

Do you think I'm crazy?

Brigitte