Passing (Colonisation)

Even without raking through the documentary record one can guess the English put-on out here of fifty, sixty, two hundred and three hundred and sixty years ago. Vestiges everywhere. Old man alighting the bus out front of Har Yassin in his impeccable fixity: shirt, trousers, belt, socks and polished shoes. Most of all the pasted, recently dyed thatch with the severe flap brought over in faultless line. Carefully measured oil enough to resist the morning breeze twisting the young palms along the front of the market. (In the files there can be found a photograph of LKY's grand- or great-grandfather dressed up in a fashion that immediately reminds of the successfully passed negro down in the South three or four generations ago.... Above all of course the wincing recognition of one's former self—olive in that case rather than yellow or black.)