Where Vivid Narratives Live

Cindie’s Ladies Night Out Reading 3/27

I Got the Global Look!

This past Thursday, I attended the Black Heritage Program at my school. I was impressed by the diversity of talent shown by my Black students and was so proud that many of the performers had received recognition for maintaining at least a 3.0 GPA. I was caught off guard when they started handing out certificates to recognize Black faculty and staff. If I’d known I would receive an award, I would have dressed a little nicer–I was just in my usual humdrum teaching clothes. Plus, I thought it was a little funny to receive an award for being a Black teacher. I know that there’s so few minority teachers, but to receive an award for it?

At the end of the program, I went up to one of my advisory students and gave him a hug for maintaining at least a 3.0. The first thing he said to me was, “Ms. Roberson, I didn’t know you were Black!” I just laughed and thought to myself, “Hmm, maybe it’s a good thing I did get an award for being a Black teacher after all!”

Reminded me of when I taught in Tanzania as a Peace Corps volunteer. I stayed with a host family for the first two months. Several adults who lived on my host mother’s compound could speak English. One host sister was looking at my mini-photo album and after a while, she excitedly exclaimed, “Oh, you’re the African American!” Apparently, they had all heard that there was one out of the 29 volunteers in my group. Looking back, I could hardly blame her for not recognizing my “Blackness” for a few days. After all, I was much lighter than the average Tanzanian, I had freshly permed straight hair that usually wore in a French roll–something I quickly stopped doing since it wasn’t worth the effort!

After it was established that I was Black, then Tanzanians wanted to know which one of my parents were White (neither), how did I make my skin so light, if I came to Tanzania because of Eddie Murphy’s movie “Coming to America” and if I knew Michael Jackson!

While living in Tanzania, I also had other foreigners mistake me for being a mixed Tanzanian and compliment my English-speaking ability. I’d smile and tell them that where I was from, we prided ourselves on our ability to speak English, which of course led them to ask where I was from. Imagine my million dollar smile as I told them The United States.

When I taught in South Korea, Koreans knew I wasn’t one of them, but would ask if I was a Filipino. Egyptians thought I was Egyptian if I was walking around by myself until they attempted to talk to me in Arabic. I’d learned a few phrases of Arabic in the two years I’d taught there, but had begun teaching myself Spanish when I got my next teaching job in Mexico.

Of course, my dreadlocks made me stand out in Mexico, where most people thought I was Brazilian, which I took as a compliment since I’d just started studying capoeira. I then moved to Honduras three years later and was initially mistaken for Mexican because of the way I spoke Spanish.

When I moved to Austin, Honduras had just undergone its coup. I still had a valid Honduran driver’s license, which showed my date of birth; so Iwould use it to get into clubs. At least one guy allowed me to enter without paying a cover since my country had just suffered a coup. I just smiled and thanked him. Since I was unemployed at the time, I was happy to save a little money for a drink!

Yes, I certainly have a global look and the saga of not being recognized as a Black woman lives on. Kind of makes me wonder who people have in mind when they think of a “Black woman”?

Internationally Read

Thanks to my friends living outside the States in such exotic-sounding places like Egypt, Honduras, Mexico, Tanzania, Uzbekistan, (Canada), and the Philippines, I have earned the introductory phrase, “internationally read author”. Not that I’m going to insist that people introduce me as “The internationally read author, Teresa Y. Roberson” at such informal events such as the best baby shower I’ve ever attended just this afternoon for my tango teachers at Esquina Tango, but I’m certainly going to acknowledge that my growing readership is already international.

One of the reasons that I moved to Austin in the first place is that I could not imagine myself returning to some small monocultural place in the States. Plus, I wanted to make sure that I could pursue a variety of interests. I got my money’s worth here in Austin. There are so many things to do and interesting people to do them with that I had already reached “internationally read” status just among my fellow tango and salsa dancers here in Austin!

Cupid’s Naughty Secrets

Reading my salacious writings for Valentine’s celebration

So tonight was a night of many firsts: my first reading of exclusively my own book excerpts, short story and poetry; my first book signing; and Esquina Tango’s first book reading. I entertained about 30 people with my make-you-blush writings in the cozy, warmly decorated red, yellow and black surroundings of the tango studio where I take dance lessons.

Previously, people had only known me as a high school science teacher who enjoyed dancing and doing capoeira, which was reflected in the audience who had come out to hear me read: tangueros, salseros and capoeiristas.

After reading excerpts from my book and before reading my erotic poetry, I read some “confessions” that the audience had written, which ranged from a parent’s wish that his/her adult son would move out of the house to a confession of a drug and drunken sexual escapade.

The Valentine’s celebration ended for me at one of my favorite Mexican restaurants, El Sol y La Luna, where I enjoyed a coconut margarita and chalupa eclipse among other delightful, edible treats while swapping memorable, bilingual stories.

Carnaval

This year’s carnaval, featuring the Austin Samba School and of course, my fellow capoeiristas and me from Capoeira Evolucao, was better than last year’s. We capoeiristas again formed a roda around the samba performers so they could do their spectacular thing twice during the night, which had the theme of Alice in Wonderland. I’m so happy that they made our security job a bit easier by arranging the squared off barricades near the stage so that the stage itself was the fourth side.

After both samba performances, we had our own little show on the side. Although I didn’t play capoeira, many Evolucao capoeiristas did, along with capoeiristas from other places. I found it amusing that guys were obviously beginners would go aggressively against Mestre Metido and how he teased and taunted them before putting them in their place.

Just like last year, many carnaval participants were in varying degrees of nudity, most relying on painted costumes whereas some just looked like inebriated people who’d drunkenly taken off their clothes during the course of the night. Nonetheless, what can one expect from the biggest carnaval celebration in the States?

Cupid’s Naughty Secrets

I’ll be the first to confess: I nearly spent what I pay in rent on audio equipment since Esquina Tango does not have a microphone for me to use for my first reading/book signing event on Sunday, Feb. 13th, 7 to 9 pm. Some would be in a post buyer’s panic over the expense, but I know that I have to invest in my own dreams if I expect anyone else to follow suit. As a matter of fact, it pleases my little Virgo-controlling heart to do as much as I can to make my first time as painless as possible. Plus, now that I have my own microphone, I’m very motivated to set up other readings/book signings.

On another note…for about two weeks, I tried converting the pdf of “Letters from Egypt” to a word document. The finished “word” document wouldn’t copy and paste into my blog, but the document would not cooperate. Finally, I just uploaded the pdf itself although it wasn’t the best quality and I feared that someone would get a headache attempting to read it for a long period of time. Not one week after I posted it, Egyptians started clamoring for Mubarak to step down. I must admit, I’m borderline superstitious enough to believe that the difficulty in converting and uploading my “Letters from Egypt” was a sign of exciting times to come now in Egypt! The dull alternative is simply to believe that those two things are merely a coinicidence.

Inaugural Post

Here’s the day I’ve been waiting for: I’m finally writing my first post because my busybody, perfectionist self is finally satisfied that my blog is good enough to start inviting people to view it. Plus, I’m in the mist of putting together my first reading/book signing at Esquina Tango on Feb. 13th, which is not as far away as it seems. This has been an exciting process that actually started seven years ago when I dreamed of the first line of Tribe of One: “Life would be so much easier if I was not a gay white man trapped in a black woman’s body.” I woke up and immediately wrote that line down. Now, I’m a self-published author, launched a blog and about to have my first one-woman show to promote my writing.

Not only did I have a tremendous sense of accomplishment seeing my book in print, but felt that 2011 would be a year with many different opportunities. One of the best things about living through the uncertain financial times of a recession is that I am motivated to pursue different interests that I may not have previously done. I figured out a few months ago that I had all the resources I needed to be happy and successful since I am not a one-trick pony! When the situation changes, I have enough varied interests, skills and hobbies to nurture, adapt and eventually land solidly on my feet.