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- So, I was six years old in the first grade,
and I was sitting at a table with my three best friends.
And we were all really similar.
All of our moms bought us clothes from The Children's Place,
and we all liked to play house during recess.
And all of our names started with the letter A.
It was Ashyia, Amanda, Alisha,
and Aleeza.
And we were working on the icebreaker project
of the first grade,
which our teacher Miss Harrington had assigned to us,
and it was going to be self-portraits.
So that we could hang them up on the wall,
and get to know each other's faces and names.
And I was really excited for this project.
And I knew it was really special,
because there were three drafts.
And we were working on the final draft,
which was going to be colored in.
And I was super-stoked for this,
because over the summer my mom had bought me
this coloring book,
that taught me all these really great techniques
for how to draw properly,
and I finally mastered coloring inside of the lines.
And I was so excited to show my friends my new skill,
that I was basically young Picasso.
(audience chuckling)
And I also knew this was a special project,
because we were using oil pastels.
And I loved oil pastels because they're really soft.
So I would pinch off a little bit,
and melt it between my fingers,
and they were expensive for my public school
in New York City.
And so each table got one box.
And each box got,
each box had one of each color.
So you had to be patient
and wait for your color to not be used.
And at this point,
I had colored in my shirt blue,
and the background green,
and there was a little tree.
And I had drawn in all the features of my face,
which the book had taught me to do first.
And I drawn my lips and my nose,
and I was ready to color in my face.
And all of my friends had used the peach oil pastel
to color in their face,
and since we were basically all the same girl,
I figured I would use peach, too.
And so finally, when it was available I picked it up,
and I started drawing so slowly going around my lips,
and my eyes,
and was coloring in all one direction.
And I was watching as the oil pastel melt into the paper,
and my face come alive.
And I colored inside of the lines.
And when I looked down,
it was like I was looking into a mirror.
This girl I had just drawn was exactly how I see myself.
And I feel my teacher, Miss Harrington over my shoulder.
And Miss Harrington loved it when people drew well.
And so I was getting ready for her to praise me.
To say, "Aleeza, that is the most beautiful
"self-portrait I have ever seen.
"I'm going to hang it above my desk,
"so everyone who comes in can see it."
And instead, Miss Jill Harrington says,
"Aleeza, that's not your color."
(audience gasping)
And, I'm confused by this,
because I don't understand how colors can belong to people.
But before I can find a way to ask her,
she's gone to the oil pastel box,
and started looking through it.
And she doesn't find the color that she's looking for,
and so she goes to the crayon bin.
And now, every school had this infamous crayon bin.
It had bits and pieces of wrapped up and gross crayons
that have been rolling around that bin forever.
And I never went to the crayon bin.
But nonetheless, Miss Harrington is rummaging through it.
And she reaches in, she pulls out this little nub
of a brown crayon that's unwrapped and gross.
And she hands it to me.
And I'm still really confused by all of this.
But I notice my friends are staring at me.
And my heart is beating really fast.
And I want this to be over.
And so, I just grabbed the crayon
and I start coloring in my face,
and I'm going in all different directions,
except for the fact that wax crayon
and oil pastel don't mix together.
They don't belong on the same paper.
So it doesn't matter how hard I'm pushing,
because I can't get the crayon to stick.
And I'm coloring outside of the lines.
And when I looked down at this paper,
I'm this grotesque monster
that can't decide if she wants to be peach or brown.
And I want to beg Miss Harrington,
"Please don't hang this up.
"I'll do it all over again.
"I'll use the colors that you want me to."
But before I can find the right words,
she's taken my self-portrait,
and put it into a pile
with all of my even-toned peach friends.
And it gets hung up.
And that night I go home
and I asked my mom why I wasn't allowed to be peach.
And she explained it as best as you can to a six-year-old
who's just gone through an identity crisis.
She says "I'm not peach, and your dad isn't peach,
"and since you are our daughter,
"you're not peach either."
But this confused me even more,
because my parents are just like my peach friend's parents.
They sound the same, they make the same small talk.
But they're not the same.
And everyone seems to understand this concept of color,
and I'm not getting it,
and I don't want my mom to think I'm stupid.
And so, I don't ask her any further.
And I try to not think about it.
But it wasn't that easy.
A couple of months later,
we had a day called 'International Day.’
We had it once a year at my elementary school
where everyone would dress up
in the traditional clothing
of the country that they're from,
or that their parents are from.
And it was meant to celebrate diversity, and heritage.
And I hated 'International Day.’
Because well first off, my mom is from Afghanistan,
and my dad is from Pakistan,
so each year I alternate,
which is a whole other story on it's own.
(audience laughing)
But, it didn't matter who I was marching with that year,
because they always seem to understand
the tradition better than I did.
Or, they spoke (speaking in a foreign language),
which I did not.
And so, even though we were the same color,
I didn't belong with them completely.
Just like I apparently didn't belong with my peach friends.
And I didn't know where I fit,
and I was stuck in this color limbo.
But I finally graduated elementary school,
and moved onto sixth grade.
And thought I had left this whole concept
of colors behind me.
And so, on the first day of sixth grade
I was really excited.
It was a brand new start,
and we were all trying to get to know each other
by asking questions,
like "Where did you go to elementary school?"
And "What's your favorite book?"
And this one kid comes up to me and he says,
"What race are you?"
And I had never been blatantly asked this question before.
And so I didn't have a prepared answer.
And so, I thought back to Miss Harrington
and that brown crayon.
So I told him I'm brown.
And he gets this confused look on his face.
And he says "What do you mean you're brown?
"Brown isn't a race."
And I couldn't believe it.
I couldn't believe that I had finally said "I'm brown."
And it still wasn't enough,
and then this little six-year-old girl deep inside of me
gets really angry, and then I get really angry,
and then I'm screaming at him,
and I said, "You know what?
"If I say I'm brown, then that's it, I'm brown."
And he never spoke to me again.
(audience laughing)
Which was fine, because I had finally found
the words to stand up for myself.
And I finally come to terms with who I was.
And I want to say that was the end of it.
Because I was okay with who I was,
that I never had to stand up,
or defend my race again, but that just wasn't true.
I was growing up in post-911 New York City,
where being brown put me in this category of 'Others.’
And I had been questioned about who I was
many times after that.
And I had to reaffirm over and over,
that I'm brown, I'm brown, I'm brown.
Because no matter what anyone says to me
will make me question that again.
Because I worked so hard to love the skin that I'm in.
And nothing anyone can say will take that away from me.
- [Woman] Amen!
- And today, if you ask me
to draw a self-portrait of myself,
I'll draw a confident young woman,
who's proud of her Afghan and Pakistani heritage.
Who is a proud American.
And I would find the most beautiful soft oil pastel
to color in my face.
No one would have to tell me to pick it up,
and it would be my first choice.
Thank you.
(audience applauding and cheering)