‘Some of the guests got out of the pool when I got in’: World traveler says this is where NOT to travel as a dark-skinned Black person
After traveling to Europe, a woman shared the places she thinks a Black person should never travel to. Monique (@worldlyroxi), who is Black, shared some of the encounters she had while staying in Italy in 2018.
The travel influencer, who boasts 66,000 followers, garnered 3.4 million views on her viral video by Wednesday afternoon. At the start of her video, Monique states her name and explains how she has traveled to over 30 countries worldwide, most of them being solo-trips.
“The country that treated me the worst, as a dark-skinned Black woman, was Italy,” she says.
Giving context, Monique says that in 2018, she took a trip over to Europe by herself and visited a couple of countries over the duration of her stay. Monique says she visited Italy and Greece on her trip and that she she spent four days in each country.
“From the moment that I landed in the Rome International Airport, I was treated poorly,” she says.
Monique says that she normally books her transportation from the airport to the hostel before she lands when traveling solo. While in Italy, she says the first thing she had to do when arriving was find the company that was supposed to be transporting her to her hostel.
“When I got to the kiosk of the company that I already previously booked,” she says, “those people would not even talk to me.”
Monique says there were white people using the same transportation company, and they were helped immediately.
“The issue was not that they didn’t speak any English,” Monique emphasizes, “it’s that they didn’t wanna talk to me.” She says she overheard the employees speaking English to the other customers.
Monique says that this was her first time in Italy, so she decided to just “brush off the airport experience.”
She says she felt very comfortable at the hostel because it felt very diverse. She also says she chose this hostel because there was a grocery store and train in close proximity.
“I checked into my hostel and then went right next door to the market,” she says. “Y’all, I have never in my life been followed around a grocery store, the way I was in Rome.”
Monique says there was one man who followed her around the store, aisle-to-aisle, specifically to make sure she wasn’t stealing anything.
“This market, it was small, but there were at least 25 people in there doing the same thing I was doing,” she adds, “but since I was the only black person in there at that time, I was being watched.”
When shopping for her groceries, Monique says she used a scanning app on her phone that translates the ingredients of a product to you if you point your camera at the word you want to translate. She says when trying to translate a product, the man who was following her around ran up to her screaming, “No photos!”
Monique says she told the man she wasn’t taking a photo, and was just trying to translate the ingredients. “But he got so aggressive with me,” she says, “I checked out with the couple of items I already had and went about my business.”
Next, Monique shows a picture of herself in Florence, standing in front of a statue. “I was on this tour with a white woman and her teenage son,” she says. “It was just the 3 of us on this full-day tour.”
Monique says the treatment she endured was so bad, a white woman asked her to stick with them for the rest of the day. “For a white woman to see, and witness how poorly I was being treated, that should speak volumes,” she adds.
Then, Monique says she wanted to buy a shirt for her son from one of the street vendors in Florence. “We made a stop,” she says, "the man wouldn’t even sell me a T-shirt."
She says by her second day in Rome, she wanted to switch her flight and leave. Nevertheless, she says she pushed through.
The day Monique got to visit the Colosseum, she says she chose to take the train from her hostel to get there. Once she got off the train, and found where to meet her tour group, she says she met another dark-skinned man and shows a photo with him on a green-screen in her video.
Monique says the man agreed with her that Black people are treated poorly in Italy.
“I understand that not everyone’s experience will be like this,” she says. “But for what I’m saying, just be cautious, be aware that this could potentially happen to you if you visit Rome, and, yeah, just keep that in mind.”
Monique captioned her video, “This is MY experience and nobody can invalidate that. If you had a different experience, I’m so happy you did as nobody deserved to be treated that way. If Italy is in your list, do not travel there alone and stay aware of your surroundings!”
@worldlyroxi DISCLAIMER: This is MY experience and nobody can invalidate it. If you had a different experience, I’m so happy you did as nobody deserved to be treated that way. If Italy is in your list, do not travel there alone and stay aware of your surroundings! #travelstories #italytraveltips #italytravel #travelhorrorstories #solotraveler #solotravelstories #travelingwhileblack ♬ original sound - Monique | World Traveler
Viewers agreed with Monique's assessment of Italy and begged for more content like this.
“I went to Rome. Some of the guests got out of the pool when I got in,” one viewer shared.
"I’m not surprised. Keep this going. What other countries aren’t good for us?" the top comment on the video from @___mo33 asked.
Another begged Monique to "please make this a series," while another referred to her as the potential "Keith Lee of traveling."
The Daily Dot reached out to Monique via TikTok direct message.
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