To be Black and to Succeed - Part 2
The Path to Social Recognition
This article is the continuation of Christophe's story, which I began to tell in my previous post (To be Black and to Succeed - Part 1).
We left Christophe freshly graduated, as he could feel the rage growing inside him, faced with the gap between the world of the housing estate where he'd grown up and the one he glimpses in Paris. He was realizing that his skin color and his name were closing some doors for him.
He's now about to start his studies as a gateway to his professional life, and continues to search for his place.
Part 2 - Studies and the Working World
I discovered the world when I started my studies. Well, I discovered another world.
I arrived in Paris, in a good university in the center of the city. At the time, university was not very popular. What was valued were Engineering and Business Schools that required 2 years preparatory classes and competitive examinations to get in. University was for scholars, to become a professor.
But for me, it was my way out, my way up the social ladder.
Yet, right from the start, I was struck by the reality of who the students were. Many of them were only there for want of something better. There were those who had come from preparatory classes because they had failed the competitive examinations to get into renowned schools. I remember that before joining the university, I simply hadn’t heard about that system of preparatory classes.
Some others were there because they didn't know what else to do in life. They just sat there, in the lecture halls, wandering around, waiting to find out, under no apparent pressure.
And then there were the foreigners, the immigrants, like me, for whom university was the only real way out.
Getting there got me out of my suburb. Even though at first I easily hung out with guys from the suburbs like me, blacks and Arabs, there was also diversity, and I made new friends.
A Car to Go Out
What enabled me to start integrating into this new world was having a car, because at that time my parents were beginning to have more financial resource.
Looking back, for me it was at 35 that I started to have money, to be able to invest and build up my assets. Before that, it wasn't even possible, because I didn't have much in my bank account. I had to accumulate money first, then be able to invest.
It was the same for my parents. They had no money until they were 50. Despite very good diplomas, it took them 20 years to accumulate enough. That's why we lived on a housing estate in the suburbs. Then they were able to buy the pharmacy and the house, but still in the suburbs. Paris was out of their reach.
When I arrived at university, we were just starting to make the switch, my parents were starting to have a bit of money and to reap the benefits of decades of work.
That allowed us to have two cars at home, and I could take one out. My other friends from the suburbs took the bus. I could go out in the evening, socialize and drive home, without having to wait until 5 a.m. for the first train.
Another Reality
Going out with my new friends, that's when I realized the difference between us from the suburbs, and Parisians.
I discovered how these young people had parties at home when their parents weren't around. Many had divorced parents, or country houses where they parents would go away for the weekend. But in the housing estates, there was just no room to have a party at home: apartments were too small, with often lots of brothers and sisters at home. It was impossible, it was all happening outside.
I remember a guy who used his parents' whole apartment. It was a huge one, and in a beautiful (and expensive) district of Paris. I couldn't believe my eyes! And I'd say to myself, “Does this really exist?” And every time, that's what shocked me, that it seemed normal to them, that they didn't even realize how it not normal it was to me.
I was so envious, I thought it was so unfair. My parents used to tell me that if poor people knew what rich people had, it would be a revolution. For me, it was an internal volcanic eruption.
And in these parties, what did I see my new friends doing ? Smoking, drinking, taking drugs. And I said to myself, “But you're the ones buying the drugs we're selling! Why don't you get arrested?”
As for me, I didn't drink, I didn't smoke, I didn't do drugs. And I told myself, now's not the time to smoke, because if there's the slightest problem, I'm the one who'll take it. “Ou ja neg'!”
* If you remember from part 1, This what Christophe regularly heard his mother say to him in Creole: “You're already a nigger”, watch what you do.
And yet it was me that people frequently asked: “Do you have some...” I was tagged as the black guy from the suburbs who was going to be able to supply everyone. That's something that pissed me off. Like, I'm a dealer !?
At a party once, one of the guys was so wasted that he'd soiled himself in. He'd disappeared for 2 or 3 hours, locking himself in the toilets. We had to dismantle the lock to get him out and clean him up.
I thought back to the guys who had fallen into heroin in my suburban housing estate. It was a shock to realize that the same thing was happening in Paris, but that it was happening inside the walls, and wasn't as obvious.
And the sense of injustice I felt was that the consequences on these young people's lives weren't the same either.
Christophe is Dating Girls
When I started dating girls, I was the one carrying them everywhere with my car. My father said to me one day, “How long are you going to be a cab driver? No, Christophe, you don't understand. What you need is to have friends who are higher up than you, richer than you, so that you can understand how things work in their world. That's how you can become part of their world”.
Because the girlfriends I used to date, they came from the suburbs, and they had limited ambitions. One of them, her ultimate dream was to work in a McDonald's. She said to me, “Come on, let's have a kid, and then we'll live on the dole.”
I said no.
My father's words got through to me. I went out with a girl from university, whose parents had a big house in a posh Parisian neighborhood, with even a garden. I'd never seen anything like it: three floors, a Jaguar, all of it! Her father was a great lover of art and opera.
I joined her group of friends. I was already familiar with classical music thanks to my father, but this time I learned a whole lot of stuff, a whole lot of codes.
Her parents were divorced. Her mother had a boyfriend who lived in a château, a real old-style one in Normandy. There you see people with money and power!
She had a brother that was 17 or 18. I remember he was attending a renowned private high school, and yet he wasn’t putting in any effort. He spent his time playing on his Game Boy, and hanging out with his buddies, all of them wearing expensive clothes and shoes. He smoked weed with his friends, but of course never had any problems with the police.
Me, I was afraid of the cops. It was the time of the Malik Oussekine affair and we were always getting arrested for identity checks (Note : Malik Oussekine was a young Arab that was killed by the police during student protests, emphasizing the difference of treatment for people that did not look caucasian).
I was actually very envious of my girlfriend. To top it off, her father bought her an apartment when we were together. So at the age of 24, she was already the owner of a two-room in the nicer part of town! Another world. She wanted us to move in together.
I realized pretty early that it was never going to work out over the long term between us.
Not only because all the privileges she had enraged me, but also because I wanted to do it alone. I wanted to show my own worth, without being “the husband of” someone, the one who is seen as living off the other.
Looking for an Internship
At the end of my master's degree, I had to complete an internship.
Up until then, I hadn't done much. But the job-hunting horizon was looming, and I told myself I had to get started, because soon I'd have to find myself a real job.
So far I was average. I repeated my second year, but then I got motivated. And I passed my master's at the Ecole Normale Supérieure de Cachan (highly renowned college in France). It was a possibility we had, and I thought it would be nice to have this stamp on my resume.
But I had a really hard time finding an internship. There were plenty who found one on their own. I tried applying directly, but it didn't work. I had underestimated the impact of my family name, which is clearly African-sounding.
For those who couldn't find an internship, the school had agreements with companies to take on trainees. But here too there was a glitch. Anyone with a foreign-sounding name, whether Arabic or African, would get the reply “We do not wish to continue with this person.” Sic. The one who got an internship that way had a very French-sounding name, like Jean-Charles Durand.
As a result, I did my internship in-house, in one of the school's research department. It ended up being a very interesting internship, but still.
In a way, it confirmed what my parents had experienced before me, and the fear of putting my family name on my resume.
“Are you the Repairman?”
Towards the end of my studies, on my way to a recruitment interview, one incident hit me hard, almost as hard as when I got turned away from my first nightclub.
I remember putting a lot of care in my appearance for that interview. I had the right shirt, the right pants and shoes, an expensive tie.
I walked into the train station and went to the ticket machine to buy my fare. And There was a guy, apparently in a panic, calling out to me and saying: “Are you the repairman who's coming to fix the machine? My ticket won't come out!”
I was overcome with rage inside.
I looked at myself from the outside, 360 degrees, and wondered if I really looked like a maintenance man there. At that exact moment when I thought I'd ticked all the boxes, I'd done everything right, I'd shaved, I'd combed my hair, I'd dressed. I'd studied for years.
All of this to fit in. And yet the guy tells me I look like a maintenance man!
All I wanted to do was punch him in the face, to say, “You idiot, do you really think in your head that I look like a ticket machine maintenance agent?”
But I kept quiet. “Ou ja neg.”
And in my head, I asked myself: But what does it take in this world to fit in? What does it take to be allowed to be normal? Not to be mistaken for a drug dealer, a troublemaker, or a maintenance worker?
Clearly, my conclusion was that I had to earn money.
Throughout most of my studies, I had stayed with my girlfriend. Thanks to her, I had gained access to other circles of power and wealth. It showed me that there could be Black people in these circles too, but these Black people were rich.
Money softens color differences.
An Alluring Resume
It was pretty clear that my master's degree in mechanics wasn't going to be enough. I couldn't see myself becoming an engineer or a professor, it just didn't appeal to me.
I told myself I had to do something else. I applied for a 5th year of study, and in parallel I applied as well to an MBA-like course in a very good French college, that was open to engineering students.
I was accepted into both, the MBA being an evening course over 2 years.
The following year, I completed my master during the day, and in the evening, I attended classes for the MBA. The second year, I did my military service at the same time. I was a reserve lieutenant during the day, and in the evening I finished my MBA.
By the end of that year, I was starting to build up quite a resume, with my master from Normale Sup and an MBA from the Sorbonne.
“I Want to be That Guy.”
Once bitten, twice shy. When I finished my studies, I was afraid to mention my name and address on a job application. So I didn't apply to French companies, I chose to apply to American ones.
That's how I got into a major international consulting firm.
They were organizing a presentation at an engineering school, as was common practice at the time, and a friend invited me.
Then I saw a guy coming in. He was an Arab, a manager. He took a pocket watch out, and clicked on it to check the time.
There, I said to myself, “I want to be that guy”. If he can do it, I can do it too. It's possible for a guy like me.
I applied to that company, and they took me on. When I got the letter of employment, it was the happiest day of my life.
Integration Through Work
That job changed my life.
When I joined this consulting firm, it was super hard, super formative, and a great social elevator.
I started out as an analyst, and had to absorb a lot. I was overwhelmed by the complexity. All together, I had to learn the technical side of things - IT -, but also a trade, and the codes of a new company. Things for which my degree courses hadn't really prepared me.
Note: This was an international consulting firm, which at the time had entered the market for large-scale IT projects, technical projects on which Christophe would spend his entire career. The grades were very precise: you started out as an analyst, and could then progress to consultant in two years, then manager, then senior manager, then partner.
I had complexes about the fact that I didn't come through preparatory classes and hadn’t graduated from an Engineering school, but through university (A very French complex indeed). The others, whether they came from the suburbs, Paris or the countryside, could put forward their famous engineering schools. But I was always feeling that I was missing something to have the right to be there.
I'd look at the people who had already become consultants, including one who was also black, and he seemed to have such a mastery of what he was doing, I was impressed!
I'd arrive home in the evening, completely exhausted, and I'd literally start crying. One evening, I said to my father, “Dad, you know, it's hard, my colleagues are really good, they can do it... I'm not...”
I didn't have time to finish my sentence when my father turned on me. He said, “There's no such thing as a good person or a bad person. It's work, that's all! Work is stronger than talent, and skills are acquired. So work. Shut up and work. Fake it until you make it.”
My dad is a great guy, really. He knows everything about everything.
The Story of Christophe's (Step)Father
The man Christophe calls his father is in fact his stepfather (see Part 1). He's from Cameroon, and was born in Ebolowa, in the village of Engebagnou, which means “big mouth”. And Christophe says he does indeed have a big mouth.
He was the only boy out of 10 children, and at the age of 8 his parents sent him to live with his grandmother in town so he could get an education. He was admitted to a renowned school, and while he was the son of country farmers, he found himself in class with the nation's wealthy future elites.
He received a military-style education, and earned a scholarship to study veterinary medicine at one of France's top schools. He learned to always be the best, to know everything about French culture, and to earn the respect he wasn't granted by default.
He passed on to Christophe his capacity for hard work, his high standards and his need for recognition.
The Metamorphosis
Thanks to my father, I hung in there. I worked hard until I acquired the skills.
I watched the guys who impressed me with their way of being and their mastery of different skills. And to find my place, I copied them. In my way of doing things, there was a bit of Dominique, a bit of Hervé, a bit of Guillaume, a bit of Laurent...
I said to myself, “If I can combine the best of each of them, I'll be one of them”. And that's how I built myself up.
It was hard, but by working, I could be recognized and find my place.
I developed a form of schizophrenia. Every morning, when I got to work, I'd go “Showtime!” and I'd put on my mask and play the role that was expected of me.
It had already started with university, this switching between identities. In the suburbs, I behaved according to suburban codes. When I was in Paris, I used Parisian codes.
At work, I learned to fit into the mold. And the mold accepted me!
Recognition
What carried me through those years was that in this company where I worked, it was fair. It was a bit like being in the army.
You worked, you knew clearly what you had to do, what was expected of you, you knew who your general was. And you knew how much you were going to earn. It was clear. It was fair. It was fair if you played along.
Maybe you could be tricked once. But if you played by the rules, and found the right mentor, they'd tell you how to do the thing, you'd do it, and in the end there was zero reason why you shouldn't get the recognition.
I began to get the hang of it, to find my place, and to progress within the company.
Year after year I was promoted, and earned more and more money.
I thrived in this environment, and learned a lot. It was really challenging though. It wasn't for everyone, I won't deny that. But it suited me perfectly. It fitted in with my competitive, addictive state of mind.
All in all, I was very happy.
I traveled the world in a suit and tie and in business class. I had the Amex Gold card, and a frequent flyer Platinium card.
I worked in eleven countries, and visited forty.
Every six weeks, my girlfriend and I would pick a place and spend a weekend there. Rome, Bratislava, Tulum in Mexico, Phuket in Thailand, and so on.
I was the guy with the pocket watch! I was Gatsby the Magnificent.
I could get into any club, I could date.
I was beautiful.
We leave Christophe in the midst of his professional ascent, but what follows will show how his past will catch up with him, and lead him to face up to and then overcome his patterns.
