The Other Americans

by Laila Lalami

He had seen this kind of thing before, he said, in the Casablanca protests of 1981. He shook his head in disbelief. I think he was just realizing that he had moved six thousand miles for safety, only to find that he was not safe at all.

We were the only girls in the jazz band; we had last names that teachers always shortened to an initial; we celebrated holidays that were not listed on the school calendar; we were cast as the Magi in the Christmas play every year, despite our protestations that we were girls, always the Magi, with flowing white scarves covering our long hair, and robes dissimulating our budding breasts and hips.

I didn’t know how to navigate back to my state of ignorance. There was no map I could follow.