UK, Ireland /
Sad life of a Polish migrant in the UK. Ch. 5 - Racism [259]
Hmm, haven't got time to read the whole thread, so reply is based on Ksysia start post. apologies if I offend anyone else's deeply held beliefs etc because I didn't read their post - it's not meant to be a racist or any other kind of slur...
In Finland I was branded a f***ing Russian (I had bad Finnish and they didn't speak English). White with dark hair, can't speak Finnish properly, = must be a Ruskie.
In England I was a Paddy (and other negative comments), subhuman.
In Paris I wasn't a Parisian (and therefore subhuman of some kind).
In Harvey IL, USA (a black suburb of Chicago) I was a honkie, subhuman.
In Romania they thought I was a Hungarian as I was too white and had bad Romanian, subhuman.
In Sweden they decided I was a Finn (I was with Finns), subhuman.
I hasten to add that this was a small minority of people in each country. Most people are basically ok. We notice those who aren't.
In all of the above personal experiences of racism, it was occasional and generally the exception.
I do get a constant trickle of innate anti-Irish racism from many English acquaintances, mainly those who can't understand why Ireland ever wanted to be independent of the UK. It's a sort of post-imperial thing or whatnot.
They don't even realize that they are being racist, and certainly don't mean to be so.
Of course we the Irish have lots of nice words for the English too :D
