Yes, D.C. resident Nikki Peele thinks race relations have improved and, yes, she would count herself among those African-Americans who see themselves as better off than they were five years ago. With optimism for still better things ahead. But. There's a but.

It involves the story of hailing a cab. And when she's done telling it, the progress of which she earlier spoke doesn't seem so tangible—even to her.

"Despite the fact that I have a college degree—I guess I'd be considered a professional person, I have this look of 'I've accomplished something'—at the end of the day when I'm on the corner trying to hail a cab to get to my next destination, I'm smacked in the face again," says Peele, who writes as the Advoc8te at Congress Heights on the Rise.

In other words, she has one hell of a time getting a cab.

How hard it is depends what she's wearing (if she's in a business suit, her chances go up), who else is around (if there's a white guy 10 feet down the street, her chances go down), and what time it is (forget it if it's after 11 p.m.).

"In the eyes of many, I'm still a black girl on the corner who may have a lot of problems," she says. "What's so shocking about that is that it's been people of color who have passed me by. There is still a racial issue. There is still a stereotype issue."

Various outlets and institutions weigh in from time to time on this age-old topic (for instance, here and here). But this week on her blog, Peele offered 10 "rules of engagement" for "hailing while black." From the introduction:

The primary reason I bought my first car 10 years ago was because I got tired of cab drivers rolling right past me to pick up a non-black (usually white) fare. I remember one night after I had been working late in Georgetown and spending a ½ hour fruitlessly trying to hail a cab. I finally gave up and asked a white couple on the street to hail a cab for me—they did and five minutes later I was in a cab and on my way home to Northwest. That night I decided it was time to buy a car.

In those days I didn't think it could get any more difficult, boy was I was wrong, it could and would become much more difficult to get taxicab service in the District. Imagine being black AND trying to get a cab to drive you to "Southeast", talk about mission impossible. Coordinating a cab ride to Southeast while black becomes a full fledge undercover operation full of psychological analysis, bait-and-switch, and good old fashion moxie.

Her rules: Stage 1 is the "Capture," in which she recommends identifying a sympathetic non-black person—"the whiter the better," she explains—to hail a cab on your behalf. Also, be sure to be in the cab "with the door firmly closed" before telling the driver where you are going.

Stage 2 is the "Misdirection." "I’ve learned from experience that the best way to win a fight is to avoid a fight, so when telling the cab driver your destination keep this in mind," she writes. "Never, ever ask a cab driver if he will take you to Southeast (you might as well get out of the cab at this point); I find it best to deal in a general direction (down South Capital Street) or a landmark (National Stadium) rather than providing a specific east of the river address."

If Peele needs a cab from home—where there's no option but to give the address—she starts calling around two hours ahead. And she calls every company in the book. Even if they say they're coming, she assumes they're not (and a lot of times they don't).

Before she got laid off from her job as director of operations for a legal staffing company 16 months ago, she traveled a fair amount, and would always have to make a calculation. Is it worth it to undergo the time-consuming call-around? Or better just to drive herself to the airport and fork over the money for parking?

It's not just getting a cab, either, Peele says. Try getting a pizza.

"You just adjust," she says. "I think as a person of color, we have these situations—they come up, they're unfair, they're illogical, and most times they're illegal, but you just have to adjust. You have to get from Point A to Point B. We succeed in spite of those things."

A parting thought: “No matter how bad I think it is for women of color or people in River East in general, I know it's much worse for men of color."

Photograph by Darrow Montgomery

In the Dec. 23 complaint, Abdelkader Nsiri, 33, who worked from August to November as a manager in charge of hiring hosts and wait and kitchen staff, says Kabab-ji's human resources director, Khal Risheq, referred to Arabs as "stupid and ignorant," North Africans as "sensitive complainers and trouble makers," and African-Americans as "slaves." Nsiri, who is Tunisian but has lived in the U.S. for about 10 years, was allegedly instructed to shave his goatee, which made him look like a "Kuwaiti faggot."

The complaint says that the restaurant's management and corporate staff prevented the hiring of Arabs and other minorities for positions at the front of the restaurant—and that Nsiri was demoted after recommending an African-American for a hostess job. Soon after, he was terminated altogether, says Peter Mina, his lawyer. (Mina says the restaurant is challenging his claim for unemployment benefits; a hearing was scheduled for today.)

Reached at the restaurant by telephone Friday, Risheq said: "I would love to respond, but we have a lawyer who is handling this issue." Referring without explanation to "blackmail," he added that he himself is Muslim and that "we have plenty of Arabs here."

Someone from Kabab-ji who identified himself only as Sam later called Washington City Paper and said that, on the advice of the restaurant's lawyer, all he could say was: "All these allegations are totally false. Their lawyer is threatening litigation." Sam Najjar is the head of operations for Kabab-ji USA, according to the firm that handles local PR for the restaurant.

The restaurant opened in Dupont Circle in November and is too new to have much of an established following yet here, but its restaurants abroad (the chain is headquartered in Lebanon) have a good reputation. The local outlet attempts to plow the same ground as the local Lebanese Taverna group, which has dragged Middle Eastern cuisine out of its suburban kebab shops and given it the full-service restaurant treatment, complete with wine menus and cocktail service.

The EEOC complaint, among other things, alleges that Risheq refused to hire one job candidate of Tunisian origin, saying that he "was not attractive and with his beard 'would have Americans thinking he was a terrorist.'"

From the complaint:

Mr. Risheq required Mr. Nsiri and other managers to implement a hiring program that discriminated against anyone that was not a young, attractive, white female. Further, Mr. Risheq informed the staff that he did not want anyone over 26-years-old working at the front of the restaurant. Mr Risheq also ruled out any applications from African-Americans whom he referred to as "abeed" (the Arabic word for "slaves").

On October 9, 2009, Mr. Nsiri interviewed a black female applicant for a hostess position. When Mr. Nsiri referred her to Samer [identified as the corporate trainer] for a follow up interview, Samer rejected her and told Mr. Nsiri that he was ignorant and blind because he was "sending an ugly black girl with a hairy face," to him for an interview. Mr. Najjar added that he did not want to talk to her because he "had enough of those niggers."

According to the complaint, Risheq also instructed the restaurant staff to change their names to sound more "American"—"Mac" for Majed, for instance, and "Sam" for Sameer. Employees, including Nsiri, were prevented from speaking Arabic even if they didn't know English, "forcing them to resort to hand signals as the only means of communication," the complaint says.

Mina also says Nsiri's managers violated his disability rights by interfering with his ability to take medication for depression, anxiety, and a reflux condition, and to seek treatment for a work-related injury.

UPDATE: According to Mina, although the EEOC complaint indicates it was Najjar who said he did not want to talk to the African-American hostess candidate because he "had enough of those niggers," it was actually Samer, identified as the "corporate trainer." Mina said he would make the correction with the EEOC.

Despite U.S. Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr.’s willingness to talk about race in America and his pledge to end racial profiling, his Department of Justice hasn’t done much to dismantle Bush-era guidelines on national security; Those guidelines not only promote racial profiling by the Federal Bureau of Investigation but create justification for state and local law enforcement agents to do it too, the ACLU charges.

"Racial profiling remains a widespread and pervasive problem throughout the U.S., impacting the lives of millions of people in the African American, Asian, Latino, South Asian, Arab and Muslim communities," Chandra Bhatnagar, staff attorney with the ACLU Human Rights Program and the main author of the report said in a press release. "The U.S. government must take urgent, direct action to rid the nation of the scourge of racial and ethnic profiling and bring this country into conformity with both the Constitution and international human rights obligations."

The ACLU made the charges in a report to the U.N. Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination. To read the press release or the entire report, click here.