To the girl in 12D,

Hi. You’re probably not going to remember me after today, and that’s really okay. I’ll remember you though, and I kind of wish I wouldn’t.

The first thing I noticed about you was that you were carrying a bouquet of flowers on to the plane. You were sitting in my seat, and I was reluctant to talk to you because I had been up for more than forty hours and I was exhausted. They were pretty, but I cringed because I’m pretty allergic to pollen. But hey, they’re your flowers and not mine, so I’d deal.

Like I said before, I was pretty tired. I already looked like trash and felt like it after the stress of finals and moving out over the last few days. My voice was soft and I was half-asleep as I showed you my boarding pass with the seat number that you were currently occupying, and I didn’t really feel comfortable with the way you immediately dismissed me and called me a stupid immigrant as soon as I was out of earshot to talk to an air hostess to see if there was a mistake.

For your information, I was born and brought up in this country and I know for a fact that I don’t have an accent. And even if I did, who cares? My brother wasn’t born in this country and that didn’t make him any less of a human being than it makes me.

Anyway, the air hostess came over and checked our boarding passes, and kindly informed you that your seat was across the aisle. I felt bad because the flight was pretty much full, and that probably was a bit humiliating, but all I wanted was to go to sleep and fly home. I asked if you could please move your luggage from the overhead compartment over my head, but you derisively said no and to deal with it, and I had to try to put my luggage in an overhead compartment at the very end of the plane, which meant that I would have to wait for everyone to leave before I could leave the plane.

That was still okay, really. It didn’t irritate me at all. What did irritate me was how you said I smelled like curry and needed to go back to a 7/11 where I belong as I was walking away. I knew for a fact that I smelled like vanilla and soap because I’m pretty self-conscious about hygiene. I have yet to meet an actual person of my race that either smells like curry or owns a gas station, to be honest. You were pretty much the same age as me, maybe even a year or two older, so I don’t know how you had gotten through your life thinking those things. I really wasn’t expecting the older woman next to you to snap at you and say that saying anything similar to what was coming out of your mouth was unacceptable.

We hadn’t even taken off yet. I was thankful for the older woman because she made me feel a little more comfortable about the situation. I fell asleep before take-off, and the times that I woke up during the flight, I was sneezing and had red eyes due to your pretty flowers that I was allergic to. Again, they were your flowers and I wasn’t going to say anything. But then you told me to shut up after I had another sneezing fit, and I just sighed because it wasn’t worth saying anything.

I wish I did. I wish I stood up for myself and my race, but causing a scene isn’t my style and neither is public humiliation, so I just turned away and went back to sleep.

When we landed, you took your luggage down from the overhead compartment and nearly hit me in the face with your suitcase, and you probably would have if I didn’t move out of the way in time. You shoved past me to get off the plane, which I was stuck on anyway because I had to wait for it to clear out to fetch my luggage from the back.

But you’ll probably never remember me. I can’t say the same. I had spent much of my childhood coming to terms about my race and culture, and your words hurt. Maybe I was being sensitive, and I knew that some people harbored hate for others they didn’t know, but it was a large slap in the face today. After the political issues and uprisings lately, your actions just cemented some of my frustration.

I don’t wish harm against you though. I hope that one day you’ll become more culturally aware and have a little less hate for others.

Sincerely,
The girl in 12C