Southern Hospitality: Not For Newcomers

Southern Hospitality, but Not for Newcomers

“A newbie not yet brazen enough, I always carried a Bible, which seemed to work better than a hitchhiker’s thumb.  When kindhearted folks—men in immaculate suits and women in puffy, flowery dresses—stopped for me and asked what church I was going to, I would invariably say “Yours.” – Yunte Huang

The above quote is what I found to be standard as far as Southern hospitality when I moved to North Carolina, back in 2007.  Though I was only there for two years I was able to gain a deep respect the South had for not only hospitality and family, but also comprehend how foreign their way of life seems to one from upstate NY. 

Every time I come across someone speaking of the South, whether it be for cooking, culture or religion, I cannot help but recall one of my favorite movies, “Sweet Home Alabama.”  Within this movie you have a young girl who, originally from the South, moves to the North; only to find herself right back where she came from.  Her fancy “Yankee” attitude and way of dressing does not fit in with her friends and family from her youth.  She slowly realizes you can take the girl out of the South, but you can never take the South out of the girl. 

I reference this particular movie as a way to show the closeness and values of family and township, the kind I have only experienced in the two years in Tarboro, NC.  Though Huang in his article speaks of immigration and the short lived HB 56 law, acceptance within one’s community is still shown and appreciated not only by the writer, but also by the reader, despite the fear enacted through what was termed “The harshest immigration law in the United States.” 

Within that small community of Tarboro I was the stranger.  In point of fact, I was worse than an immigrant or simply a stranger one did not know.  I was a Yankee, raised all my life in the Hudson Valley of Central New York State.  I dared to seek and gain employment in a period of time when small town residents of Tarboro were finding the “Job Prospect” scarce.  How dare some Yankee white girl come into their town and get a job as a secretary, with her fancy way of talking and her pretty clothes, when so many went without and had to rely upon the Government for financial assistance.  Walking around that small, provincial town, of which there were more churches on a single street than there were residential homes, I felt as if I had landed upon a foreign planet. 

One of the first memories I have from those first two weeks recalls strolling down Main Street.  The weather was warm, almost muggy and the sun was shining overhead.  I came across a café advertising them-selves as a tea shop.  Lord be praised, I was saved!  Finally!  Civilization!    I walked inside hoping to get a Chai Latte.  There was not a single Starbucks to be found.  In fact, the nearest Starbucks was down in Raleigh, a good hour and 45 minutes away.  I was to be disappointed, unfortunately.  Though they advertised themselves as a “Tea Shop,” their specialty was good, ol’fashioned Southern Tea.  Now if you have ever drunk Southern Tea you will know, for us Yankees, you might as well take a pitcher of Ice Tea and pour an entire bag of sugar into it.  This Southern delicacy is simply that sweet, much too sweet for my Yankee senses. 

Huang describes the benevolent nature he encountered with his neighbors and the friendly, welcoming encouragement of those who would give him a ride to various church services on Sunday.  He states “Before Xenophobia began to cast a different spell on the South, the folks were courteous, warmhearted, and always ready to help out a stranger.”  How accurate his words are especially to a lonely, white girl from the north, who knew nothing of the way of life in the south.  He also emphasizes the racial differences to be found within the south: “Yellow, I found, was not a visible color in a society where everything had for more than two centuries been black or white.” 

This came home to me on a Sunday when I was invited to a BBQ by a elderly black couple, who happened to know my father.  There I was, Miss Yankee White Girl from NYS, whom no one would speak to; and yet everyone looked at as if she was the newest attraction at a side show carnival.  The food was odd, to say the least.  I was expecting Hamburgers, Hot Dogs, Chicken, Potato Salad, Macaroni Salad, and various doses of alcoholic beverages.  What I encountered was more of that demonic Southern Tea.  It stalked me.  There was also a pig roast, a goat roast, a cat fish boiling in a big pot over a fire (Catfish Stew), a whole lot of boiled greens, corn on the cob, even more greens; but not a single hamburger or potato salad anywhere. 

When I finally came back to NY in 2010, I felt as if I had returned to cultured civilization.  I mean, we at least have Starbucks!  Though I was not an immigrant from a foreign country, I might as well have been.  I was looked upon as stealing jobs from locals, and not one who would easily be or should be trusted.  Never know what us Yankees might try and steal next from the South. I came to appreciate over the years, the small nuances of southern society, though vastly different than our own, here in the North.  I now read, not only in Huang’s words, but also from other articles of terror and racial crimes sweeping the south. Though Alabama’s HB 56 law has for the most part been repealed as being unconstitutional, it has a shadow that reached far and wide through the south, gripping in Southernism in its fear of the unknown. 

An article, written by Benjy Sarlin for MSNBC, explains how HB 56 had an impact not only upon Alabama’s immigrants, but also within its legal citizens.  He focused within his article to show how this affected Alabama’s Hispanic communities.  Alabama’s view of immigration was best termed as “illegal is illegal.” There were no pretty, flowery terms to overlook one’s legal status.  If you were suspected of being an illegal, you were arrested.  It mattered not if you actually were a citizen or had working papers, allowing you to reside there.  Just the idea and fear that this law imbued poured forth changing a State’s voice. 

“There were a lot of false interpretations of the law – and then it would change or the courts would rule again,” Fetner said. “For a while it was memorandum city.”  - Benjy Sarlin

As Huang so eloquently ended his essay “I’m waxing nostalgic because I miss the time when the sweet Southern air was, at least for this immigrant, not poisoned by fear or malevolent phobia that haunts Dixie today.  As Charlie Chan might have asked “What in the name of Confucius happened to Southern hospitality?”

References:

Perl, Sondra, and Mimi Schwartz. "Southern Hospitality, but Not for Newcomers - Yunte Huang." Writing True: The Art and Craft of Creative Nonfiction. Second ed. Boston: Wadsworth, 2006. 390. Print.

Sarlin, Benjy. "How America’s Harshest Immigration Law Failed." MSNBC. 16 Dec. 2013. Web. 22 Dec. 2015.