Rihanna has me in my bag and it’s not even noon yet. Amidst a conundrum of a year thus far, the multi-millionaire todóloga’s perspective is always a breath of fresh air. Her latest Vogue cover interview is no different.
Sandwiched betwixt several revelations, including the comforting fact that she is “very aggressively” working on new music (God knows we need it), is the fact that Mexico is a new part-time home for the 32-year-old artist. She explains why the North American country makes her feel at home and why she deeply relates to the plight of the Latinx community.
“The Guyanese are like the Mexicans of Barbados,” she said. “So I identify—and that’s why I really relate and empathize with Mexican people or Latino people, who are discriminated against in America. I know what it feels like to have the immigration come into your home in the middle of the night and drag people out.”
Rihanna has been vocal about immigrant rights in the past and takes great pride in her origins.
“For me, it’s a prideful word,” she told The Cut last year about the word ‘immigrant.’ “To know that you can come from humble beginnings and just take over whatever you want to, dominate at whatever you put your mind to. The world becomes your oyster, and there’s no limit. Wherever I go, except for Barbados, I’m an immigrant. I think people forget that a lot of times.”
Rihanna was born Robyn Rihanna Fenty in St. Michael, Barbados to a Guyanese mother and Barbadian father.
“If you love me,” she said. “Everyone out here is just like me. A million Rihannas out there, getting treated like dirt.”
She now moves back and forth between a few homes at off-schedules due to the nature of her many business hats. Barbados, Paris and London provide outlets of creativity and comfort. Each has taught her something about injustice and herself. Mexico, she says, is where she feels most relaxed.
“I just love Mexico. I really need to do my DNA test,” she joking told Afua Hirsch of Vogue. Perhaps she was an agave plant, in a past life, she pondered. In that case, we know we were the tequila to match.