I have a picture of Lord Krishna and his lady love Radha in my wallet. I worship him as guruvayoorappan, Kannan, Narayanan…... The main idol in front of the Diya that we occasionally lit in our apartment is that of Guvuvayoorappan, the lord himself. Well… if the lord were to appear in front of me one fine day; I am scared- I might be a bit disappointed. Cos the Krishna as depicted in Puranas is dark and the Krishna I saw in Nitish Bharadwaj, is not. As a child, Doordarshan taught me Puranas (in addition to theory classes by my grand parents) and as per the B.R.Chopra’s Mahabharat, Krishna is tall, fair and handsome. That is how I still want Krishna to be… I hope he forgives me for me being so harsh on him… I will deal with him later (perhaps a paalpaayasam will do:)). So, the thing is I won’t be happy if I find my dear Lord, in the color of the stone itself. I want him to look like the actors who play his role in the television sops. So, it’s all about reluctance to embrace the darker tone of the skin…. It’s bowing to the feeling of superiority that the white skins possess.
I am not a white myself & I hate getting tanned and I know it’s the general feel. All of us run from the heat and cover our faces in scarf and never forgets to bathe in sunscreen lotions. We are still in search of the sunscreen wit the maximum SPF. The reason behind the panic is not just the U V rays … it’s the fear of seeing our faces all deep brown that scares us. We know that we don’t look good with a deep tan; the beaches and those sun bathes are for those models n Greek god look alkies’. It’s for the WHITES as we call them…
I cringe to recall how I felt when one of those old ladies whom I met at a wedding reception exclaimed, “Look, how dark she has become”. My college education in Pondicherry left a deep tan on my face and even my younger sister reminded me to take care of my color!!! I was quite chubby as a toddler and as I grew up I lost fat and color. I got used to talks like- “oh… how cute u were as a child”. I didn’t know how to react to such sly comments. Considering the speakers’ age and my mothers whacking skills, my response would be a polite smile.
We have this uncanny fever for anything white… anything foreign… Perceptions differ from one person to another. Fair people do not fit my definition of beautiful/handsome. But I have heard people use dark/white as the general term to describe a person. “Don’t u know that dark, tall girl/guy?”…. we categorize people as dark and white. Given a choice to opt between dark/white, we would opt for the superior version- the white.
Those creams/face packs that claim to enhance complexion never escapes my shopping kit. It’s the yearning to be classified as the superior of the race… to escape the criticisms from wagging tongues, of being tabooed as ‘dark’. Nobody likes being a dark; we don’t have the privilege to choose our complexion either. I still marvel at the flawless skin of those whites around….. n sigh at my deeply tanned arms… Am I not a racial discriminator!!!!
I am not a white myself & I hate getting tanned and I know it’s the general feel. All of us run from the heat and cover our faces in scarf and never forgets to bathe in sunscreen lotions. We are still in search of the sunscreen wit the maximum SPF. The reason behind the panic is not just the U V rays … it’s the fear of seeing our faces all deep brown that scares us. We know that we don’t look good with a deep tan; the beaches and those sun bathes are for those models n Greek god look alkies’. It’s for the WHITES as we call them…
I cringe to recall how I felt when one of those old ladies whom I met at a wedding reception exclaimed, “Look, how dark she has become”. My college education in Pondicherry left a deep tan on my face and even my younger sister reminded me to take care of my color!!! I was quite chubby as a toddler and as I grew up I lost fat and color. I got used to talks like- “oh… how cute u were as a child”. I didn’t know how to react to such sly comments. Considering the speakers’ age and my mothers whacking skills, my response would be a polite smile.
We have this uncanny fever for anything white… anything foreign… Perceptions differ from one person to another. Fair people do not fit my definition of beautiful/handsome. But I have heard people use dark/white as the general term to describe a person. “Don’t u know that dark, tall girl/guy?”…. we categorize people as dark and white. Given a choice to opt between dark/white, we would opt for the superior version- the white.
Those creams/face packs that claim to enhance complexion never escapes my shopping kit. It’s the yearning to be classified as the superior of the race… to escape the criticisms from wagging tongues, of being tabooed as ‘dark’. Nobody likes being a dark; we don’t have the privilege to choose our complexion either. I still marvel at the flawless skin of those whites around….. n sigh at my deeply tanned arms… Am I not a racial discriminator!!!!
