“Y’all why did my cousin book this AirBnB with a cotton field in the yard?” TikToker @thechocolateweeb writes in the overlay text of a now-viral video she posted on Friday.
The video shows an expansive cotton field behind the user, whose bio says her name is Aliyah Bell. In the caption of the video, Bell clarified that her cousin didn’t know about the field when she booked the property.
Bell’s video now has over 13 million views, and she has posted a tour of the Airbnb, which is located in Huntsville, Alabama. She said that her family stayed in the house to celebrate Thanksgiving.
“It is actually pretty decent inside,” Bell says. “Being put in an area like [a cotton field] unexpectedly as a Black person does trigger you a little bit and makes you feel uncomfortable.”
She also mentions that she experienced an “urge” to pick the cotton—not that she wanted to “go back to slavery,” of course.
“It’s an odd feeling that you feel so close to history,” Bell says.
Bell received many comments about how cotton fields in Alabama are “everywhere.” Some even called her “city folk.”
In response, she said that “city folks are not weird, cotton fields is not normal” in another follow-up video.
“The fact of it is it made you uncomfortable,” @cuppola1 commented on another follow-up video posted by Bell. “That’s all you should have to say for decent people to understand.”
“Why do people love ignoring historical context,” user @mielicy wrote.
The Daily Dot reached out to Bell and Airbnb.
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