Before I came to America, I was Sandra. I was a student, a daughter, a sister. I was African, Congolese. Did I ever define myself as black? No. My skin color didn’t determine who I was as a person. Everyone was black. My interests, my beliefs, defined me. My skin color was simply a fact about me, like the fact that I like candy. If you ask who I am as a person, I wouldn’t say, “I like candy.” That’s not a fundamental thing that describes me. But in America, my skin color did define me, at least in other people’s eyes. I was black. I was black first, and then I was Sandra.
