Being Kachou

Imagine, being born in a white family on a snowy afternoon in February. Well that's me! Born on February 13, the eve of the Valentine's Day, a little girl with a white skin, because melanin spread few days after birth, black babies and mixed-race babies are born white-ish. When I was born my mother could have thinking, that I was going to be white, but after few days my skin slightly toned brown. Of course she knew, I was going to be a mixed-race child and that my skin, my hair and my eyes were going to be different from hers. My family never showed signs of a physical difference between them and I, I was their daughter, granddaughter, niece, the lost duck among geese.

I saw myself since I was born as a white child, doing "white" activities. I went to Jura (region in France) every summer with my grandparents,sailed with my mother, did horseback with rich kids and ate snails at Christmas. Everything was going perfectly in this world of rejection and total ignorance. But one day I realized that there was no resemblance with my mother, but not knowing where the difference was, I decided to ignore it and keep doing my "white" things.

One day in 1st grade, my teacher ask us to bring a picture of our fathers, in order to prepare framework made of macaroni for Father's Day - So kitsch -. Having no father - my mother the Virgin Mary and God is black - I run at home to develop with my mother a plan of attack that could get me out of this mess ... My mother wanting her daughter not to be pointing at and be take part in this activity, went digging through an old box of pictures. After a few minutes search, she found THE photo, the one that will help me to make this beautiful framework made of uncooked noodle, the one that will not make me seem to be the reincarnation of Jesus, the one that will allow me to apply my artistic talents of professional liar. This picture is blurry, we can see a man sitting, writing something on a piece of paper, that man is left-handed,  with brown hair and white skin, this man is my uncle, 23-year-old back then and already bald.

On a sunny morning in June 1992 I went to school with my huge backpack, my sneakers, and my little dress - fashion in the 90s was cruel. I come to class all happy to express my creative culinary art of a 6 years old.

The teacher asks us to leave the pictures of our desk, i was proud to leave it on my desk, probably because with my mother we prepared the day before my explanation in the case my teacher asks something. My teacher goes through the class rows, and does not hesitate to comment on the fathers, as if she were single and one of us may have a divorced or widowed father, she was hunting for the ideal husband. "Your father has beautiful eyes", "He looks great," "You can tell your father to do sports," she was salivating like a teen.

Then come my turn, I look at her with a big smile on my face, she grabbed the picture was carefully placed on the edge of my desk, she observed my picture, I felt that a question would arise of her mouth, I was mentally ready to unpack my lie. And suddenly she throws me "you could have taken a somewhat clearer picture of your dad, Agnes ..." To which I retorted "we got robbed two years ago and the bad guys took most of our pictures, unfortunately this is the only one they have left " the trap is closed. In my head, I knew that lying was not a good thing, but then I took it as an improvisation course, I had to react to a situation vividly and realistically, I was proud of my achievement, I felt that the Oscar was close and that my acting career was experiencing promising debut! But my teacher kept the picture firmly and looked at it closer, and there she says very convinced, "but this is not your father? " I had to react quickly and well, I try remember the different responses as quickly as possible without leaving a single stress expression on my face. I say to her "but, that's my father, we do not see too well but he is", but the unthinkable happens, like a wicked witch without heart, my teacher, in front of my classmates, says "the person in the picture is white, it seemed to me that your mother was white." My face changed in a split second, I do not know what to think or what to say, I was unmasked, my lie was discovered, she knew that this bald man was not my father but I did not understand how she knew. I did not understand why she had referred to the fact that my father could not be white.

While questioning myself, I begin my artistic creation, I conscientiously stick the pasta on my cardboard frame. As I am a born artist, I color some pasta. My masterpiece is finally finished, my work is equal to a Rodin, my was quintessence is born. I put the final touch, the photo and then the frame is complementary finished.

At the end of class, I brought my quintessence in my satchel, which was still too big, I place it in the living room, on a large solid wood buffet. My mother comes home from work and sees my frame sitting proudly on the buffet, I saw in her eyes that she liked my daub. These pasta, these beautiful colors, the finest frames ever seen.

After a not in depth consideration of my masterpiece, she asked me about our ambush "So how was it with the teacher? " I did not know what to say, I do not want her to be disappointed, but I still decided to tell the truth, I reply sheepishly "my teacher has discovered that this was not my father ... " My mother was quite surprised, she gave me a suspicious look accompanied by a slight questioning movement of her head. "How your teacher has discovered that this was not your father? We do not even see his face, all you can see is, his head and part of his left arm. ".  I did not know what to say because she was using a rhetorical tone, but also because I did not have a concrete answer to give her. I told her that my teacher told me that the person in the picture could not be my father because the person was white. And as if my mother had prepared her shot, as if she knew that the teacher was going to question the veracity of my words, my dear mother asks "do you understand why she told you that?". Me being ignorant and having rejected any difference between people, I did not see where she was going, I was only 6 years old and that day in June 1992 I discovered that Men are born with different gender but also skin tone.

Before that I'd never seen myself as a black person, I grew up in a family of whites, who never pointed at me that I was different in terms of color, because my family as crazy it may be, saw no dissimilarity.

16 years later, I baby sit my cousins ​​at home, playing and discussing about very deep things for a 6 years old like pals, tv, fries, many things that do not make sense for an adult, but for a 6 year old kid is very down to earth. In the middle of our passionate discussion, one of them says, "do you know that Africans pee from the buttock and poop by the pipi? " Without hesitating I ask him to repeat to see if I had heard what I had just heard. He tells me words to words the same shit, I then ask the following question, "it would mean that I pee from the butt and poop by the pipi..." while listening to my question my two cousins burst out laughing and then say "bah  your are not black!". I explained in a quite childish way, that my father is African and therefore I took a bit of his skin color, they had never seen the difference they saw me as their cousin, their sister, daughter their aunt, niece of their father, granddaughter of their grandparents, but not like a little duck that was swimming in the middle of the white swans...