vacation Archives - The Race Card Project

I get sunburned in ten minutes.

March 17, 2025March 17, 2025 albino, CA, Christine Leach, genes, irish, joke, Nigeria, painful, San Francisco, SPF, sunburn, vacation

Christine Leach,
San Francisco, CA.

If the sun is intense enough, I can and have gotten sunburned in ten minutes, literally. I joke with my friend in Nigeria that I can’t visit him because it’d be too painful, physically. It’s a silly point, but one I’ve joked with friends about, who are black, hispanic, or just not as borderline albino (Irish genes) about how they don’t understand just how much SPF I need to apply to get through a vacation, or a day at the beach. Several have chuckled while saying they’ve never been sunburned.

Ain’t Nothin’ Wrong Being a Factory Rat.

September 5, 2022September 5, 2022 AR, Diane Payne, factory, factory rat, General Motors, Holland, MI, Monticello, vacation, Walter and May Reuther Family Education Center

Diane Payne,
Monticello, AR.

I grew up in Holland, Michigan, a town where most everyone considered themselves quite lucky to have a job in a factory. Just about all my relatives worked in a factory. I remember the first time I visited General Motors for a family day, and I was continuously on the lookout for rats, but never saw a one. One summer our family went to the Walter and May Reuther Family Education Center First for a two week vacation. This was the time I was surrounded by nothing but “factory rats,” and the first time I got to sleep in a bed alone and eat as much food as I desired. Not a bad life being a factory rat.

Not as white as I appear.

June 15, 2020January 3, 2022 assume, Cherokee, English, first experience, first impression, German, human, irish, judge, Kansas City, look white, MO, Mohawk, Native, Native American, Navajor, restaurant, scottish, serve, sister, Susi Matthews, vacation, variety, white

Susi Matthews,
Kansas City, MO.

I am 1/4 Navajo plus Cherokee and Mohawk. I am also English, Irish, Scots and German. I LOOK white; my full sister looks Native. I experienced the reactions she got when we were kids on vacation. A small restaurant in Colorado thought she was Native America and refused to serve her…until my parents came in and they realized their mistake. Dad gave them a piece of his mind and we left. I never forgot that.

We all judge by first impressions and make mistaken assumptions. We all need to check our assumptions and see lovely human beings in all variety, shapes, colors and potentials.

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