Oprah Winfrey is one of the world’s richest women but it didn’t stop a Zurich shop assistant from assuming she couldn’t afford the bag she wanted to buy. I talk about the real risks of travelling when black and sadly, they are more troublesome than having trouble buying a £24,000 bag.
Oprah Guardian
There was a depressing familiarity to Oprah Winfrey’s tale of racism in an upmarket Swiss boutique.
Billionaire TV presenter Oprah is a household name around the world but this didn’t stop the staff in an Zurich handbag shop from assuming she couldn’t afford the expensive bag she wanted to buy.
In Oprah’s case, she decided not to make a scene or to play the ‘do you know who I am?’ card, instead choosing to leave the shop and spend her money elsewhere.
Oprah knew just mentioning her experience would be pay back enough and already the owner of the boutique has apologised and tried to explain away the incident as a ‘misunderstanding’.
While £25k handbags are not normally on my shopping list, being made acutely aware of your race when you leave the safety of home is all too familiar…
This article was originally published in the Guardian with thanks to Writers of Colour
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