How I Came to Africa and Became a 16 year-old Chinese Muslim

If you’re pale and go to Africa, you have to get used to being addressed as White Person. Or obrunni. Or mzungu. Mulungu. Toubab. This is sometimes followed by a list of countries. England? Australia? You come from Germany? America, ah! Go Obama! I was often called “ama” (mother) in Malawi, “sistah” in Ghana or by one man, “small small American” (the additional “small” replacing the word “very” in Ghanaian English vernacular).

Here in Lesotho, I should be Lekhooa. Though I find Ausi (sister) or ‘Me, (mama) or even banana or nana (little girl and baby respectively) preferable to being called by a color, for every one time I hear “Lekhooa,” I get about ten “Machinas.”

Machina, if it is not obvious to you, means Chinese person. I must have been called Machina for months before I realized it. In May, when my Sesotho was at its most competent, while running in the morning, I heard clear as a bell, “Ha uena, Machina” (“Hey you, Chinese person”). I stopped in my tracks turned back to the two men who had passed me and said, “Are you blind?!” They laughed and said, “Oh!” and my neighbors and I had a good laugh about it on the way to school.

But since then, I started noticing that I was being referred to as Chinese in various ways at least two or three times a week. As I said, more often than being called “Lekhooa,” I am addressed as Machina, Chinese, Chinesey and Mao Tse Tung by Basotho of all ages from toddler to the elderly and seemingly of a variety of social classes. I am often greeted on the street with a “Nia hao” (hello in Mandarin). On more than one occasion, I have been taunted with streams of fake Chinese (including once by a group of students in the uniform of a prestigious international secondary school). At the bank, the teller once stared at me dumbfounded when I told him I wanted to make a deposit. After an awkwardly long pause, he came to, and said, “Sorry, I was just surprised you are speaking English because you look so Chinese.” (Where to start? “There are Chinese people in America?” “There are Chinese people who speak English?” “You were a moron to think that in the first place, and an even bigger moron to say it aloud?” “Shut up and process my damn deposit before I scream?”)

Oh, by the way, in general, I think it is fair to say that the Basotho hate the Chinese. The Chinese own successful businesses, not just in Maseru, but seemingly in every small village and town in the country. They own the textile factories, which along with mining provide more jobs to Basotho than any other profession. The main complaint of Basotho people is that the Chinese steal business away from the locals. One of my dearest colleagues also informed me “they keep dirty houses.” Needless to say, it’s not nice to be associated with a group that attracts so much animosity (more bluntly, it’s not nice to be hated), and arguing that I’m not Chinese in some ways seems like a tacit agreement that “Chinese” is indeed something to be ashamed of.

Also, by the way, in case it’s been so long since you’ve seen me that you forgot what I look like, I have pinkish skin, herbal tea-colored hair (no milk) and eyes wide and round enough to suggest a thyroid disorder. And whether it is right or wrong, accurate or not, un-PC and racist, I associate none of these features with those of Chinese people. I’ve started surveying people of various ethnicities and nationalities (American, Indian, New Zealander, Zambian, Italian), as well as Basotho with varying degrees of education to ask them what the heck is so Chinese about me. Most of them act completely shocked and only one Mosotho finally conceded with, “Do you have a Chinese grandmother?” This suggests that most Basotho do not think I’m Chinese, but those that do feel compelled to remind me of it. Most agreed that my height (five feet) could be a contributing factor. Round face made sense enough. Some Basotho said it was probably my hair style and glasses. I didn’t think that the haphazard arrangement hanging down from my scalp counts as a “style,” and moreover, whether I’m wearing glasses or contacts, or have my hair in a bun, tied back, braided or hanging loose, seems to have no bearing on my presumed racial/national identity of the day.

When I told my boss about this phenomenon he said incredulously, “You’re definitely a WASP.” Well he got the W right (despite what the Basotho think). Being a Jew in Lesotho has it’s own set of complications. I have yet to meet a Basotho who isn’t Christian and when you befriend one, it isn’t long before they invite you to their Mormon, Pentacostal, revivalist or non-denominational Christian church. The following is a compilation of various conversations that then ensue.

Me: No thank you, I’m not a Christian.
Christian: You don’t like Christians?
Me: No, I just happen to not be one, and churches are for Christians.
Christian: Are you a Muslim?
Me: No, I’m a Jew.
Christian: Oh. Is that some kind of Muslim?
Me: No.
Christian: So what do you do?
Me: You don’t know what Jews are? You know, the people who live in Israel that aren’t Muslims? They follow only the old testament of the bible? Jesus was a Jew?
Christian: Jesus! So Jews believe in Jesus!
Me: Nope.
Christian: Why?
Me: Because they don’t. Christians believe it, Jews don’t. That’s why they are two different religions.
Christian: But I don’t understand. Jesus was a Jew. And he’s for Christians. But you are not a Christian?
Me: Correct.
Christian: And you still don’t like Jesus?
Me: It’s not that I don’t like him. But if I have to be any religion, I’m going to go with the one I was born with, and in that religion, Jesus is not prophet or the son of god any more than anyone else is a child of god, just a nice guy who liked to build stuff.
Christian: But you accept Him as your personal savior, right?
Me: I accept that you believe He is your personal savior.
[awkward pause]
Christian: So you go to the mosque?

One of my colleagues is a praying machine. She prayed that my class would settle down, she prays that I will find a husband, she hasn’t admitted it but I’m pretty sure she prays I’ll convert or at the very least not end up in hell, and once she told me, “I will pray that you never leave Lesotho. I will pray even though you don’t believe in god.” I replied that I never said I don’t believe in god, only that I don’t believe in Jesus. The Fijian-British librarian overhearing the conversation thought this was a hilarious statement, so I once again patiently explained this apparent irony, meanwhile wanting to scream that I did not ask to be the spokesperson of the Jewish people, and if they could know the most basic information about world religious, I could go back to being a heathen instead of disgruntled Hebrew school teacher.

On only one occasion did the church invitation end up going down a different road. When I told the Ugandan kindergarten teacher that I don’t go to church because I’m Jewish, she told me, “I see. Yes, we have Jews in Uganda.” I almost kissed her for saving me from a mind-numbing conversation about why Jews don’t believe in Jesus and are also not Muslims. Hoping she could offer some insight on my prior conversations, I asked her how the Basotho could know nothing about Jews, especially when there are Jews in South Africa. She said simply and disappointingly, “Because Basotho are ignorant and small-minded.” So much for insight.

So apparently tolerance (see Chinese example) and world religions are not taught in schools, and I should know, because apparently I’m sweet sixteen (with a massive case of deja vous). Although I got stopped a couple of times in the NYC Port Authority by police thinking I’m a runaway teen, and my driver’s license got mercilessly scrutinized in the doorways of bars, my birthdays have never been sliced off so dramatically as they are in South Africa and Lesotho. If I mention the word “school,” people ask what grade I’m in. Other expats ask what my parents do (as in, which NGO or embassy or mission do they work for and why have they let me out at night alone). Teenage girls looking for cleaning jobs knock on my door and ask if my father is home, high school boys hit on me, middle school boys hit on me, fourteen year old girls link their arms in mine and want to be my friend. And the first time we met, at least one colleague and one parent thought I was a student, not a teacher (and the school only goes up to eighth grade)! When people find out my age, or ask me, and I make them guess, 16 is the most popular answer, followed closely by 15.

While WWOOFing on the farm of a woman with two teenage sons in July, we met their friends for a picnic in the forest. Chatting with the 10 year-old son of the other family, he was surprised to hear me mention teaching. He looked slightly disturbed and asked how old I was. When I said 24 his eyes widened further and he said, “But how can you be Matt’s girlfriend?” Unbeknownst to me, the matriarch of the family friends informed her kids that I must be Matt’s (the sixteen year old son of the farmer) girlfriend. When I had finished choking on the last of my laughter-induced tears. Both mothers conversed rapidly about my young looking skin and wondered if it was an American thing. Matt guessed South Africans have more stress than Americans which contributes to aging, although I thought the sun was the likelier aging culprit on the South African side of things. But what do I know? I’m just a teenager who can’t speak English and has a one-way ticket to hell.