Remember Napoli?
I was returning to Florence after shoe shopping there and another interesting thing happened. An older Italian man approached me as I was walking down the train station's platform. I couldn't make out what he was asking me for word-for-word, but his tone and physical gestures said it all:
How much for sex?
After telling him "Non" many times, I deliberately plunged myself into a massive crowd so he'd lose sight of me. I was lucky. I made it out of the train station, but I couldn't make sense of what had happened. (I know. I'm slow at times.) I was carrying a gazillion large bags and covered from head-to-toe in blistering heat. What had I done to be propositioned for sex? Out of all the people coming off the train, why had he picked me?
Fast forward 4 years.
I'm in Nigeria because of another family member's wedding and, during a visit to my aunt's house, I notice a copy of a major women's fashion magazine. In it, I read an article that exposes the growing sex trafficking of young Nigerian girls to Italy. It explained the process of Nigerian male "recruiters" traveling from village to village to convince the parents of girls who were close to graduating from high school that they can "sponsor" them with a college education in Europe. Upon graduation, a bus rounds them up and they are flown to Italy. Once there, the girls discover that they have been brought for a different kind of "education." Instead of a "dean", they are introduced to a "madam". Instead of "books", they are given skimpy clothing. They are stripped of their names and identities and given restricted contact with their families back home. IF they are able to touch base with family members, they dare not tell them what they have fallen into for fear of being beaten or killed.
These girls are 14 and 15 years old.
I still cannot explain what it means to be a black woman in Italy. On the one hand, there is the pleasant exchange from Italian male admirers. I experienced this on the flight with an Italian airline carrier where the male stewards were especially kinder and more attentive to me (ONLY black female going to JFK) than the female ones. They stared me directly in the eye while conversing and constantly came back to ask if I needed anything. I recall seeing a video clip of the great operatic soprano Shirley Verrett singing to a massive amphitheater in Italy and receiving overwhelming praise from her Italian audience. (Later in life, she married a man of Italian descent.) Without a doubt, the admiration is there and if you speak to any Black woman who has traveled overseas, they'll tell you the same thing : Italian men love Black women.
But, the other hand holds examples of aggressive lust, such as the incident in the train station and the present hungry appetite for young, black prostitutes. Unfortunately for the girls transplanted from Nigeria, they don't get to pick the hand they shake.
That second hand touches the United States, as well. Not too long ago, several hundred members of a prostitution ring were busted in Atlanta for trafficking young, Black girls across the Eastern U.S. region. These girls were typically 14 and 15 years old. The only difference between their situation and those in Italy is that they were not only lured, but also kidnapped. They, too, had their names and identities erased as part of the process for being chained to the ring.
Growing up, I remember going to the supermarket near my home in Bed-Stuy, Brooklyn and week after week seeing a new, young black girl's face on a Missing Persons poster. At the time, I thought they must be runaways but...now that I make the connection...it's quite scary.
They were usually 14 or 15 years old.
I have a confession to make. This was not going to be my second post. When you are a 1st generation American, you often see things from both a national and a global perspective. Sometimes the parallels you discover are thrilling and other times...they are terrifying. I do not know what to do about sex trafficking in Italy. I do not know what to do about sex trafficking in the United States. But, as a young, black female of Nigerian descent and American birth I feel obligated to speak out. This post is a declaration that the Negress sees la Negra and la Negra IS the Negress.
We share each other's pain because, in truth, we are reflections of one another.
For more information on the issue, please view these links:
