It was time to pick myself up because no-one else was going to.

Other than my skin color, I looked no different from my fellow classmates.

A PRICKLY LEAGUE BY FARZAM MIR 34THPARALLEL MAGAZINE ISSUE 60

The racism at Cornell was no surprise to me. My outfit was for the most part identical to the rest of the undergraduate students. The school mandated that each student be dressed, or as Cornell’s student handbook referred to as “garmented“, in a noire blazer with the choice of sterling or gold cufflinks, a white button-down, beige khakis, black dress shoes, and a tie of the student’s own choice of color.

And so, I suppose other than my skin color, I looked no different from my fellow classmates.

Although in a financial sense, my situation was very different from the average student. Unlike Timothy Wright, I did not spend my fall break sailing loops around the Potomac in a yacht owned by my parents. Instead, I cleaned both Barnes and Bailey Hall in order to have travel fare to return to Little Rock for winter break. And not to frame myself as the conce…