blue

I'm sitting on a cold metal bench, reading, when he sits down beside me.

He is tall, that's the first thing I notice. Easily six eight, he towers over everyone else in a room that's already full of tall men. His skin is so shiny black, like oiled coal, that the fluorescent light glances off him at odd angles. His hair is sectioned and bound into a dozen spiky knobs. He's wearing spotless red and white Nike exercise gear, and sports an enormous square diamond in his left ear. He pulls out a portable DVD player and slides in a disc.

He waits longer than most, four minutes, before striking up a conversation.

"I am Gabriel. What is your name?"

I look up from my book and sigh mentally.

"Lisa."

"Where are you going?"

"Nairobi."

"Why?"

"Work."

"What work?"

"I facilitate workshops on traumatic stress for humanitarian relief and development workers."

I can see that this one doesn't register, and I'm not surprised. It usually takes some time for native English speakers to fit those pieces together, and Gabriel speaks English with a thick West-African-French accent.

"What do you do?" I say, wondering, as always, what is compelling me to ask this. It's not that I'm not interested in what he does – I am especially curious as to where diamond came from – it's just that I don't particularly want to end up chatting at length to yet another strange man in an airport in Africa. But no matter how many times I tell myself that I'm not responsible for reciprocating interest in situations like these, it breaks all the normal rules of polite behavior to give a one word answer to a question and then return your eyes to your book. Five questions is about my limit. After that I usually buckle and return one.

I learn that he's a seaman, working cargo ships out of Djibouti. His family is from Cote D'Ivoire but now lives in Ghana. English is his fourth language, and his worst.

"Are you married?" he asks. "Do you have a boyfriend?"

This is why I don't enjoy chatting with men in airports in Africa. I wonder briefly how Jesus handled it when strange women hit on him. Probably not like this…

"I have a boyfriend," I lie shamelessly.

Gabriel does not even pause. This is something I have noticed with other men too. Apparently, if my boyfriend is allowing me to wander around Africa unsupervised, I am fair game.

"Do you like to make friends with the black man? I know some white woman; they do not like to make friends with the black man."

Flummoxed, I try to think. Answering no is out of the question. Answering yes is tantamount to an open invitation to continue this line of questioning.

I recall the face of an ex-boyfriend and mentally graft it onto my current hypothetical boyfriend.

"My boyfriend is black."

Gabriel smiles. "I like to make friends with the white woman."

I look down at my book and turn the page.

I receive more male attention in Africa than anywhere else in the world. Most of the time, however, I don't think it's because of my sparkling personality. How sparkling can you be half-asleep at 5am in an airport, especially when you're engrossed in a book? But I also don't think it's because they find me physically attractive. Most of the time I get the sense that when these men look at me – my hair, my eyes, even my skin – that what they really see is not white, but blue.

The color of my passport.

If I'm being honest, this bothers me. And the fact that it bothers me, bothers me too.

My parents have spent decades trying to teach me that it's qualities other than beauty that really matter. I'd say I believe that. Why, then, do I catch myself feeling that I would rather someone approach me because they desire me physically, than because they desire my citizenship and all the other qualities it represents – escape, freedom, and relative wealth? After all, physical beauty and citizenship are both, to a large extent, assets bestowed upon us as accidents of birth. Objectively, citizenship even has some major advantages over beauty – it tends not to depreciate in value over time, and you have to screw up really badly to lose it altogether. Physical assets, however, are subject to degradation caused by any number of things, like gravity, sun damage, neglect, and the over-application of ice cream.

"Do you do lots of travel?" Gabriel asked me suddenly, interrupting my concentrated study of page 231.

"Yes, lots!" I said, trying to sound busy, mobile, unavailable.

"I travel lots too, but when I get married I will stay at home with my wife and our children," he says significantly, clearly hoping I will take the hint and apply for a starring role in that storyline immediately.

My strategy during these conversations is to be reserved, but polite. Very rarely will I be confrontational and firmly shut someone down. Sometimes, however, I will run away.

I dig for the last of my Ghanaian Cedes and head for the small stall selling bottled water. Then I wander into the one store in Accra airport, thinking.

It's not that I blame the men for trying, I don't. I even admire their moxie sometimes. It's more that I hate the way it makes me feel defensive and objectified when I suspect that I'm simply being seen as a walking one way ticket to wealth and a better life. But why should I feel any less objectified, or any more flattered, by a man looking for a pretty smile and a tight shirt?

Perhaps I've been coming at this all wrong. Maybe my parents are right. It is other qualities that matter more than beauty – it's my passports – and what these guys don't know is that I have two of those suckers. Maybe I should start seeing them as just as tangible, and more indestructible, assets than my cup size.

Behind me, a voice calls my name.

I turn and look up. Gabriel has come to find me, to make sure that I heard that they have called pre-boarding. He presses a piece of paper with his phone number and email address on it into my hands.

"Where I come from we have a saying" he says, "my blood met your blood. When I saw you here today, my blood met your blood." He looks at me meaningfully and pauses.

On second thought, maybe I should just invest in a fake wedding ring. Call me demanding, but I need someone to be drawn to my passports, my pretty smile, and my personality.

I smile, awkward, and tuck the slip of paper into my bag.

"It was nice meeting you, too."