With a gentle rain beating on the roof over my head, in a place far from the rat race of New York or even America, I am reminded of the politics and the emotion regarding the fundamental difference between people of color and people not off color.

I am in Brazil as I contemplate and write these thoughts.

This was going to be a week that my page here would have been blank. But I have observed some things that I thought would be of use to you, as you move through the obstacles of your life.

The region I am in used to be a slave depot, where the Portuguese funneled the Africans they captured into the rest of their colonies. Even though it has been 500 years since that was started here, I observed that like in the United States, this is a very European place. Blacks, unless they are singers, rappers, or musicians, are held in a lower regard.

On TV, the main characters are white and the servants are black. The advertising, the jobs, the business owners, and the list goes on and on. While we like to think that being an American in a foreign land is enough to sometimes boost one away from that caste, it is not. For me, only meeting the right people changed that.

Even though I am supposed to be on vacation, I am reminded about our place in the world as a people or at the very least of what other people think our place should be.

The feeling some Anglos have for us is inherent, I believe almost genetic. It seems to transcend nationalities, international borders and language.

But it reminds me also that while the US has no monopoly on the ill treatment of our people, at least here, as bad it may feel to have a cab blow by you or have a tail put on you in a store, you can still beat the odds for failure. One can still carve out a statue of success for themselves from the worst chips given to them at birth. We don’t have to be unabashedly wallowed in self-pity about our circumstances, that we defeat ourselves before anyone else has even tried to beat us. If we see ourselves for who we really are and what our strengths are, we can rise above whatever gets in our way.

Here, despite not speaking the language or knowing many people, I have managed to go places, and have access to areas that only some rich or influential people could get to. It is not because I am either, since I am definitely not, but because I decided to see myself as a person who could not be blocked or kept out for any reason. In this little town where Carnival is raging, I hung out on the stage with the stars and DJs, not jammed in with the thousands of people on the ground.

The skill of navigating through other peoples’ concepts of who we are is also inherited, almost genetic. But I believe we do not use it because some of us think it is an acquired, even out of reach skill.

It isn’t. From evading lions and leopards, who saw us as food, to side stepping supervisors or co-workers who see us as the threat, our forefathers and mothers have left us with the code traits we need not only to survive but to thrive.

I believe in the phrase "God may not always give you what you want but he will give you what you need." Sometimes we can forget that our minds are in fifth gear all the time, trying to beat down our problems. But in this place, the beautiful landscapes and the rain, and the sunrises remind me of that. I also know that life as a black man could have been very different for me. My problems, no matter how weighty, pale in comparison to what our ancestors endured.

If we are meant to suffer a different fate in our lives because our skin color, I believe we are also meant to rise above it like we have for centuries. We maintain a line of strength, courage, and pride that you can only get from suffering a little and making the best out of what you have.

By the time you read this I will be back in the rat race with you. But I will be a little less anxious to be the number one rat in someone else’s race.

Maybe though, a little more ready to be a win, place or even show, in the human race.

– Gary Anthony Ramsay is a weekend anchor and journalist on the all-news cable station NY1 and a long-time resident of Queens.