The Colorism Wasn’t So Sweet

Have you ever experienced colorism from another person “of color”?

Last night, while on a date at the Sugarcane Raw Bar Grill in Miami Beach, my date and I started to feel like we were being ignored by the wait staff. I mean, when he inquired about seating, the Host didn’t seem too enthusiastic to seat us, but I just said I was being too sensitive.

We were seated, we waited for a few moments and noticed none of the wait staff stopped to get us water, or even say they’re a little busy but will have someone come right over.  My date had to stop a waiter, and then we were told someone would be right there. Fine, no problem, I was still saying I was being over-sensitive, let’s wait and see if the service gets better. It did, well, we didn’t wait that long for our food, great.

As we proceeded to eat, I needed more wasabi and ginger, we requested it. We began to eat, I let him have the wasabi and I waited and waited and waited. The waiter never returned. Not until I got another waiter’s attention, then he came over. He apologized, but the apology did not seem sincere. I looked at my date, and he began to point out that we were the “darkest” customers from what he could see. Then, it began to dawn on me, this is colorism.

Not sure about any of you, but I never took the “light-skinned, dark-skinned” thing too seriously while growing up. To be honest, the term became its realist for me while watching the latest season of Basketball Wives. Don’t judge me, I don’t remember the name of the darker complected sister, but she was very offended by Evelyn and some of the other lighter complected cast members. I thought she was “forcing it”, but as she began to describe her life experiences, though I don’t think it was the case on the show, I can see how that’s a huge point of reference for her. It seemed traumatizing. My experience was “traumatizing” however, it was a feeling of bewilderment as I was in a presumed to be “of color” restaurant filled with Latin music and Spanish-speaking staff and customers.

Needless to say, we finished our meal. My date insisted on paying the bill, so I said I’ll take care of the tip, he said “what tip, let’s go!”.

I posted a pic and gave a quick overview of the experience, let’s see if they reach out.