Shari Miller
Polk City, IA
My junior year of college, I was studying abroad in Paris, France. I had joined a gym while over there, and one day as I was returning from the common shower area with just a small towel to cover me, a French woman said loudly to everyone around her: “Mon Dieu! Mais vous êtes blanche!” (A comparable translation in English would be, “My GOD, how white you are!”) She went on and on and ON telling others to look at me while asking them if they had ever seen anyone as white as I was – and asking me if I ever got out in the sun. Still to this day I can instantly return to that moment – that feeling of being nearly naked and having my skin color being examined by everyone present in the locker room…
