What is beautiful ?
Nov 7th, 2005 by Lillian
There are some things I thought I would never get used to about living in Thailand. One, that white skin is considered beautiful. I get back from the beach with a beautiful tan, my thai friends said that I’m sooo dark. I was soo pretty before went to the beach….
Secondly, getting back from a trip to Switzerland a few years ago I had put on quite alot of weight. And I tell you, no one pretended that I hadn’t put on weight. ”fat fat” is what they told me.
The flip side of that is, when you meet a friend you haven’t seen for a while, and she says you’ve lost weight, you know that everyone has noticed. I love those conversations. I don’t need a scale in Thailand. I just need to meet old friends and they will tell me 
btw.. I met a Hr. H, a german, in Singapore a few months back and told him he had put on weight. I’m soo sorry!!!! I really must remember which culture it’s appropriate to say that and which culture it isn’t !
btw. Unless you are thai don’t you DARE comment on my weight
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I know what you mean…in India fair skin is worshipped, so I always get chastised by Indians for tanning, but what can I say? I like the golden look! And don’t get me started on weight. I seriously believed I was fat until I moved to the states and realized that I was actually a healthy weight! Living in Asia can distort your self-image sometimes!
A friend of mine told me that she was having a very hard time travelling in Asia because she had freckles. Complete strangers would come up to her and enquire about her skin disease. And when I lived in Singapore I felt like a big fat cow. I’m not. But to find shoes or clothes that weren’t meant for the wafer thin was almost impossible. I miss Asia terribly but on the up side I am cosidered positively skinny in the US and ok in Europe
We’ve had a lively discussion over at another blogsite on this very subject. Rather than diverting readers away from your blog (bad blog manners), I just copy those comments here…
JD said…
I notice all your pictures of beautiful Asians, without exception, are those who are as fair-skinned as I, a Caucasian.
In Malaysia is there an aversion to grouping darker-skinned people with “the beautiful people”, as is the case in Thailand?
When I first arrived in Thailand, I searched in vain for tanning lotion (which you can find everywhere in the USA), because I was so embarrassed about my pasty-white skin. All I got were incredulous stares from shop clerks and drug store staff.
Instead, all I found were “skin lightening” creams. Something I’ve never seen in my entire life. I ask my Thai friends, “Why, in God’s name, would you want to lose that beautiful, healthy, sexy brown color, and bleach yourself until you look like a ghost? Your skin would be considered a lucky gift from God in the West! We pay thousands of dollars for tanning lotions, ultra-violet tanning machines, and Hawaiian vacations in the sun. Just so we can look like YOU.”
They just shake their heads as if to say “This farang will never get it!”
Truly, beauty is in the eye of the beholder, not the object…
1:18 PM
Kitjar Sukjaidee said…
And yes, Malaysians love guys and gals with a fair complexion, especially among the CHinese Malaysians.
It also puzzles me when I was in Germany, I saw German men and women sunbathing in the NUDE…. urrrghh, trying to get brown all over… maybe, another Farang Kee Nok….
Nah, differnt culture different likings
2:30 PM
Nishiki said…
Indeed, in many Asian countries fair complexion is synonym for beauty. In India, whitening products generate million dollars business, maybe it’s because the hunks and babes of Bollywood have fair complexion? And when I was in Thailand, there’s no lacking of whitening cream in his closet. Even in Malaysia, you can easily find Nivea’s whitening products (for men!) in Watson and Guardian.
2:44 PM
Kitjar said…
I guess, I am an equally vain person too. Besides my usual regiment of facial scrub, facial wash, tonner and moisturizer, I also use Olay Total White Cream occasionally.
Somehow, I feel, I am a little too dark, and it would be best, if I can be a just little fairer… Weird, but very true…. That’s the pressure of skin tone for an Asian!
3:25 PM
trangam said…
I love my brown skin!! And when I said that to my friend last night… (who is as fair as any farang) he told me that I am being racist!!!
But yes, in India, whitening lotions are big business. But I know many of us who will not have it any other way. And neither would Lord Krishna & Shiva!
4:50 PM
JD said…
Fair point, Trangam. So, what are we all trying to do? Correct the “mistakes” of the gods?
5:55 PM
Nishiki said…
I was actually refering to my Thai Muslim roommate when I wrote my comment about “whitening cream in his closet”. Maybe I deleted “my roommate” without noticing…
Actually I thought I was rather fair and planned to darken my complexion, but most of my friends advised me not to do so, they said I’d look better if my complexion is fairer…hmmm….
6:16 PM
Kitjar said…
Acharn JD - If you read Mao Zedong’s thoughts, Human can move mountains…. so what more of changing our looks…. hee hee
7:18 PM
JD said…
Then Mao would have been quite proud of Thailand’s multi-billion dollar plastic surgery industry!
7:28 PM
canardbidon said…
hmmm… i dunno if the ‘fair is best’ thing works for men here too… i definitely find tanned men more attractive
10:10 PM
mikey said…
“We are beautiful, no matter what they say…words can’t bring you down”
Beautiful by Christina Aguilera
Same ol same ol, really. What you arn’t is what you think is beautiful. It’s the same the world over. Asians want to be fair, Europeans want to be dark. Americans want to be slim .
In my country, during the Great Depression (1929-1939) when people were hungry and starving, ladies with big, fat legs were considered desirable. Now that there’s a MacDonald’s fast food shop on every corner–yup Him–you’re right…we go for Miss Chopstick Legs. Whatever’s hard to come by, that’s what you want…
I spent a large portion of my life trying to arrive at a more-than-comfortable income with ample left over after bills. When I got to that point, then I decided what I wanted was to simplify life and get back to basics. Hence, poor rural upbringing, to semi-affluent big city life, to SE Asian jungle!
Always wanting what we don’t have…what does that say about us humans?!
*LOL* Although I’m actually Thai, I’m not about to go commenting on someone’s weight.
But having read the title of the post, the very first thing that came on to my mind was: “Beautiful is: Whatever that’s not being sung by James Blunt.” I have to apologise if you’re a Blunt fan, but I can’t just stand his voice anymore! Every single radio station in Munich had been playing his song ‘Beautiful’ up and down. Not even to mention the fact that I had to bare to it while I was 3 weeks back in Thailand. *urgh*
BTW, nice blog. Ich nehme auch an, dass Sie - ach, wir sind ja im Netz, sage ich einfach Du, okay?….dass Du Deutsche oder Schweizerin bist, gel? Naja, dann Grüße aus München.