Standing in an Alien Line

I’m going to relate my take on the Jeremiah Wright thing with a story.

In April, 1985, Julie and I made a trip to Ivory Coast. I had been invited to lead a missionary kid retreat in the interior of that West African country in a village called Agboville. We spent some time in England the week before we journeyed to Paris to connect with our flight to Africa. In England, it had been rainy and cool and I had dressed appropriately – corduroy pants and tweed jacket over a wool sweater. I was even appropriately dressed for Paris.

When we got to Charles DeGaulle International Airport, however, I knew I was in for something different. The Africans waiting for the flight to Abidjan (the capital of Ivory Coast) formed not even a semblance of a line. It was a mob straining toward the ticket counter, everyone jockeying for a more advantageous position – and the workers behind the counter seemed not to notice the chaos in front of them at all. This was nothing like the orderly cues all over England. I felt distain for the folks around me, but soon realized that if I were ever going to get a seat assignment, I was going to have to set aside my expectations that they form a line and instead, fight my way through the mob. I found myself not wanting to continue with the trip. I felt lost and out of my element. After I finally got the ticket agent’s attention, while leaning over a shorter man in front of me, I said, “This is crazy, isn’t it?”

She said, “What’s crazy?”

“All this,” I said, indicating the shouting disorder all around me.

Her expression was blank. “All what?”

She hadn’t noticed what I had noticed because she was in her cultural element and I was not. I felt strange, put upon, and discounted by the folks around me. I felt anxiety and anger. The woman behind the counter, though, and evidently all the other passengers, simply took the whole process in stride. I noticed that the African passengers who’d received their seating assignments chatted with each other in cheery voices, laughing and joking and generally enjoying each other’s company.

It didn’t stop there for me. All through the nine hour flight to our first stop, Bamako, the capital city of Mali, the sky had been open above us, deep blue gradually blending into a white-blue glare as my eyes swept earthward toward the horizon. The distinction between sky and earth, though, became increasingly blurred the farther south we flew. As we neared Bamako, which lies south of the Sahara, the sky gradually became thick below us with a brown haze. I found out later that I was looking at a weather phenomenon called “Harmatan.” Prevailing winds blow across the Sahara, sweeping billions of cubic feet of dust into the air and speed them over the sub-Saharan countries. From an airplane, the farther south one flies, the less distinct the land becomes.

We landed in Bamako and the plane taxied to a stop in front of a tiny terminal building. There was no jetway, just a ramp that the ground crew rolled up to the fuselage. The chief flight attendant announced that we would be refueling and letting off some passengers and that those of us who were flying on to Abidjan were welcome to stretch our legs on the tarmac. I decided to take advantage of the break after sitting crammed in that little seat for so long.

I walked down the ramp onto the tarmac and took in my first view of West Africa. Everything took on a brown-orange tint. Small scrubby trees were the singular, muted green standing on trunks of gray-brown. I could look directly up at the sun, partially shielded by the dusty air, and saw it appeared about the same size as the moon and glowed like a 40 watt bulb. The air itself felt hot and dry against my face, and soon I began to sweat inside the tweed coat I still wore.
That’s when I realized that people were staring at me. I was the only white face in the whole scene and not only that, everyone else wore colorful, flowing robes which billowed out and let breezes blow across their bodies. When I looked at them, they looked away, but I became increasingly aware of the fact that I was the alien, standing there in hot, dry weather wearing a coat perfectly suited for Northern Europe or Central Kentucky. I wanted to hide, so I virtually slouched back into the airplane and found Julie. I sat down and longed for home.

But what if I couldn’t have gone home? What if I had been going to Africa to stay? I probably would’ve sought out other white people in Abidjan and stuck with them. And I would’ve probably made fun of the dominant culture around me, using humor to cope. And I probably would’ve given vent to my anger at times as I had in the ticket line in Paris. And the Africans all around me, like that ticket agent, would’ve probably looked at me and said, “What’s your problem? Everything’s as it should be.”

I think in many ways, Jeremiah Wright represents the feelings of many minority people who’ve been standing in an alien line. Many of us majority folk, on the other hand, are like ticket agents who don’t notice anything out of place. Wright’s comments should be an opportunity for us majority folk to reflect on our processes. Unfortunately, the media stokes the emotions rather than the reason.

So, let’s slow down and take a deep breath. Let’s try a bit of listening and set aside our assumptions. Let’s see if there is any offensive way remaining in us, so that the Lord might lead us in the way everlasting.