A FOREIGNER ABROAD

Right now I'm at the tender age of 23 and I pretty much just quit my job as a pub manager and decided "Enough is enough. I want to see the world again!"

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I worked in my local pub for just over a year and while most of the friends I made, regulars I got to know and colleagues I met were and still are some of the nicest people I ever had the pleasure to meet, working in a pub also had its fair share of hostile individuals that go out of their way to put a damper on what is a truly wonderful world.

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I've over heard comments and conversations varying from...

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• "People like that shouldn't be in a place like this."

• "I'm leaving [insert name] not liking the crowd in here tonight."

• "These white people are corrupting you!" (A comment said to my former boss who's parents were from England & Nigeria about me)

• "Who do you think you are some kind of hard man with your tattoos and hair?" (Said to a colleague of mine as we escorted a very drunk costumer from the pub.

• "What you dressed like that for? You look like a traffic light!"

• "I wasn't expecting you to sound so cockney. You don't look proper English..." (A very poor attempt at a chat up line by a one-off costumer I was serving).

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I hate to admit that some off these comments are quite comical, like why would you call someone a traffic light? In all honesty his shirt didn't even resemble a traffic light, they weren't even the right colours!

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But at the heart of it you need to remember that words can be very powerful. They say 'sticks and stones may break my bones but words will never hurt me' or that 'actions speak louder than words' and despite the fact this is true, it's not the whole truth. Having someone say to my friend and colleague that they have become toxic because she was hanging out with me and we had different skin colours was shocking, it was something I never expected to experience in my little hometown. And it hurt. Before this I'd never really encountered or witnessed direct discrimination it was only something I'd read in the paper or seen in the news. This guy didn't know my boss or me, or that the fact we were really good friends outside of work, his opinion was based on an attribute that I was born with and because he shared the same skin colour as my friend he tried to initiate a divide. He tried to create 'There's a them and then there's us' with just a few words.

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People who stand on street corners to give speeches that intend to create barriers between us solely based on things that we can not and should not change about ourselves like our race, religion and culture are, in the simplest terms damn-right stupid, stubborn and small minded. 

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While I was travelling in South East Asia, I had the pleasure of meeting so many lovely people that ranged from taxi (or tuk tuk) drivers, silk makers, hostel owners and restaurant owners and guess what? Not once in my 5 weeks in these beautiful countries did I ever feel even the most minuscule amount of disapproval, unease or hostility by the people who lived there despite the fact that I was a foreigner in their country. Thousands upon thousands of people from all over the world visit the same destinations and they welcome us with open arms every time. I also know a few people from university who have moved permanently to Thailand and they always say that they were treated like family from the moment they arrived. Why do some people not have the same values?

 

I understand that different aspects of life are practised differently in various cultures, like social etiquette, education or even fashion, but kindness, integrity, compassion are not values that vary between cultures. These are values that each individual has, human qualities that have the power to connect us on a level that goes beyond language or nationality and everyone has the capacity to open themselves up by tapping into these qualities that we are born with if only we allow ourselves to. 

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This blog is a chance for people who, for whatever reason, may not want to directly venture out to learn about other cultures and instead hide behind their own disillusions about other walks of life. It's a chance for you to open your minds, I hope, even if it's just a fraction, to see that some of the people you may secretly judge or hurt with your words aren't too dissimilar to you or I.

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And for the rest of you reading or following this blog! I hope you get the chance to see or experience the rest of the world like I am. If you don't get an opportunity to, I at least hope that you've been able to see or learn just a little bit more <3