The other day I was standing in line in a post office in Harlem.
I turned to a woman behind me, who was the only other “white”(-ish) face in the post office and asked, “how do you like living here?” She said, “oh, you are thinking of moving here?” I said, yes, and she started off by saying, “Well, it’s…”diverse” around here, so you know, you have to like that.”
I thought to myself, “diverse”?
We are in the middle of Harlem.
Or, maybe, she means that there is also a Latino population?? Was she referring to the large African immigrant population? Somehow I wasn’t sure that she was even aware of the difference between African-Americans and the recent African immigrants. What does she mean?
It kind of bugged me, made me self-conscious, and also made me regret having asked her that question in the first place.
She also told me that she had heard that it got “noisy” in the summers–but perhaps, she quickly added, that was true about anywhere in Manhattan.
“Noisy?” You mean, people hanging out in the streets? I don’t understand. What’s wrong with that? If you don’t want that, shouldn’t you be living in a place where you can buy an acre of land for the same price you pay for a tiny apartment in Manhattan?
My head was full of question marks.
I didn’t understand why someone would want to move to Harlem if they were so uncomfortable around the African-American community. Harlem has been a black neighborhood for over a century and bears the richness of it.
Having had more time afterwards to put things together I came to the conclusion that she in fact was using the word “diverse” to mean that “it wasn’t white.” Wow….I thought.
Another woman walked in who looked closer to my age and friendly-looking after I had already engaged in discussion with this other one, and I really wished that I had asked the same question to her instead. She was black (like everyone else in the post office ), but didn’t look like she was a long-time resident there and that was my point: Asking someone who was new to the neighborhood what it was like coming in as a new-comer to the area.
This incident reminded me of how the word “diverse” is often used in the Jewish community as well. Isn’t “diverse” also used to mean “not white,” including the Sephardic community, in many American Jewish communities?
Te be continued…. maybe
