| Username |
Post |
| SimpleGal |
Posted
on 12-Oct-03 01:53 PM
When I came to America 10 years ago, I hadn't the faintest inkling about many things that surprised, shocked, and even horrified my young teenage mind. The large building that was my high school was an unappealing mass of steel and concrete that towered above me as I lugged myself to school on cold winter mornings. Winter is unbearably long and cruel in these parts of the east coast. And NYC, though "guarded" by its skyscrapers that gleamed in the sunlight, was no exception. At times, it was colder than Alaska. But then again, I haven't been to Alaska, so I wouldn't know. All I do know is that it wasn't pleasant on those cold winter mornings. Not for a 10th grader waiting at the 23rd street and 3rd avenue bus stop for the number Q23 bus that picked its way through morning traffic to that dreaded edifice several avenues and streets away.
I hated going to the bathrooms. They were ok--not threatening to kill your nose like the stench of restrooms in Jal-Jala or Himalaya cinema halls of Biratnagar. But I could perhaps have borne the foul air with ease. Human nature, thankfully, somehow lears to adapt to its environment, does it not? What I couldn't digest was the chatter of teen gals who flocked to the bathrooms to avoid classes. It was here that I first encountered one of the nagging issues of being female, especially in America.
"Do I look fat?" asked a petite looking Hispanic gal whose hairstyle was so fabulously done that I couldn't help staring at her for sometime. I hardly got to comb my hair in the morning rush and here were gals who had their hair well done, their nails well manicured, their makeup so perfect that it seemed high school, for them, was more of a luxury than a necessity.
Her friend to whom the question was addressed, took a quick glance at her and replied, "Girl! Whad up wid you? You call dat slim body a' yours fat? Hell no yeah!"
"You think so?" she asked with discontentment.
"You bet yo ass I think so!" she responded, and all the other gals laughed in agreement. This Hispanic gal gave a faint smile and adjusted her clothes, her eyes averted from the gaze of her friends who shook their heads. This was probably a routine interaction between her and the other gals.
Several years later, as a senior in college, I read Andrew Morton's controversial biography of Princess Diana for a course. Beneath the smile that won the hearts of millions around the world was a woman plagued by bulimia. Her husband once complained about her "chubby waist" and the need to trim it. She found herself then on the path to a binge-and-purge rampage.
There seems to be a love-hate relationship between women and food. And as a consequence, body image becomes the one of those carnival mirrors where the images are distorted and disproportionate to your actual size, yet that many of them look into and believe to be true. Many times, girls will express contentment with a salad on a date, lest the man think she's a hogger. Later on, in the safety of her home, she transforms into the little gal who loves to eat--chocolates, chinese, cookies...you name it. Why this mask? Growing up as a teenager in the hustle and bustle of NYC, I came across the monstrous and paradoxical face of gluttony and guilt among females in America. And as a college student, I became more acutely aware that many of my fellow students were not just hard working people, but little Princess Dianas.
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| Bhunte |
Posted
on 12-Oct-03 02:15 PM
I believe it is a matter of culture. In Pacific nations like Tonga, Tuvalu, Micronesia, Guam, Samoa, Salmon Islands, Marshall Islands, etc fatty people r considered to be a symbol of blessings, health, wealth, wellfed, etc.
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| Rosie |
Posted
on 12-Oct-03 02:37 PM
True...it is a matter of culture. Every society has certain features or qualities that it values and more ppl in that society want to possess those qualities. Body image is a concern in the USA but even in Nepal, there are other issues like fair skin. Commercials show how a girl who nobody liked and wanted to marry because she was dark became more desirable after she became fairer by using fairness lotions, the common one being fair n' lovely. I know many teenager girls in Nepal who have used fairness lotions like these or who have actually bleached their faces, which basically changes the chemical composition of the skin pigments and might lead to problems like skin cancer later in life. What I am trying to say is that the United States is not the only place that has problems with ppl being too conscious about looks and superficial things like that. It is pretty much human nature and every part of the world has similiar problems.
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| ru |
Posted
on 12-Oct-03 02:57 PM
as much as I agree with you, rosie and bhunte, but unfortuantely the whole concept of personality and shit!!..they are all superficial aren't they...for example, people judge people from what they know and, unless one can refrain from making 'first impressions', what else does one have to constitute one's first impression...not much huh??..
so the bottomline...while being good 'inside' is the greatest virtue, being wow 'outside' defintiely helps...however the 'wowness' is measured in that particular culture.
comments...
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| forget-me-not |
Posted
on 12-Oct-03 04:27 PM
Simpu,
Nicely put.
BTW, is being fat your problem? To me slim is not something that good....but one should not be a truck....you know what I mean, right.
Take care,
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| Dilasha |
Posted
on 12-Oct-03 08:17 PM
The only time I didn't feel like eating despite the chauraasi byanjan staring at me was when my teenage crush was sitting right next to me. I guess I was too busy staring at him no i'm just kiddin :) but ya that's a good question Simplegal. I'm also amazed by the image that media portrays especially of women to women. It's strange but that's the reality. I'm all up for a healthy balanced diet and a regular exercise to keep oneself fit but to go overboard by taking diet pills or starving to death just to become the next demi moore!! uh uh...that's not my cup of tea. I guess it all comes down our own individual perceptions, and our individual choices.
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| czar |
Posted
on 12-Oct-03 08:36 PM
A lovely vignette of restroom recollections in high school USA. Thank you simple gal, its a pleasure reading your work.
I expect that legions of school girls vainly aspire to be fashionably slim and subsequently suffer endless anxiety. A right of passage for female teens I suppose. If it isn't battling skin problems then its bilumia. Though probably more of the former than latter, given the ever expanding girths of the US population at large. To the extent that the Surgeon General has added his voice to the growing medical issues, and financial cost as well, associated with obesity.
Forget me not, pardon me for my insouciance, but if you were to assume I was either afflicted with or involved in everthing I wrote about, you may well assume that I was a crackpot of the first order. [Some will say so anyways] Haamro simple gal ta kyaa chwaank cha ni hau, ke ko fat ni ? Dhutteri !
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| czar |
Posted
on 12-Oct-03 08:40 PM
* should be bulimia, NOT bilumia.
Maaf paun, bhool suhdar garera padnu hai. Mero ta dictionary, thesaurus, spell check chaina.
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| Poonte |
Posted
on 13-Oct-03 01:09 AM
Nepal chhaunjel ta...moto-moto dekheki..oho, kasto raharlaagdo, khailagdo jyan bhanthe...dublo laai khaanai napako jasto re...
Amrika aayera tyo 250 pound wala haru dekhesi saattai gayo...meribassaiiii...tesko tighra kaatna ta bancharai chahinchha re! Ke ho tyo? Manchhe ho ki hatti? re!
[Based on a true story!] ;)
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| Suna |
Posted
on 13-Oct-03 05:35 AM
Simplegal
You brought upon a subject that is in my mind quite often!
I amaze at how many "thin pills" there are in every store and then equally amazed how many "big" people there are!! It seems to be more than an obsession - a plague!
More amazement...these thin anorexic looking girls deemed to be beauty queens!! Gosh, koi koi lai ta... phuuuuuuuuuuu gareni dhalcha jattikai huncha BUT.....it's not men, most women think those skinny looking punks are beautiful!!
Then comes this nakkal of eating thorai because women are health conscious REY!! such crap! If one was that into healthy eating... what you put into your system is equally important to how much you intake.
And all those females trying to loose weight to measure up to the western standards of beauty, remember, a sari looks good on a curvacious body than a on a stick!
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| yatri |
Posted
on 13-Oct-03 06:42 AM
>
Albeit I spent my formative teenage years in Nepal, it was while in the US, I had instilled some meaningless ( or may be not) quirks during my culminating adolescence. I realized that you need to be buffed, be a beer-guzzler, play contact-sports at a high level, and bring girls to your room on weekends to "show" your friends that you are "phat". Now that I think I am a sane person ( to some extent) I now disagree with what I had agreed upon on those years. However, old habits die hard, I sometimes lose my focus. I still have those moments when I long to pursue those activities and lots of time I have became the 'old-me'. Interestingly, over the weekend, I had an opportunity to read a Yoga magazine and I was pleasantly surprised with what it had to say about six-pack aka wash-board abs.
It is usually said that whenever a girl checks out a boy, she wants to know if the boy is working out or not. In retrospect, I have seen girls feeling out boys' biceps, and we have even seen in TVs ( mind you, TV corrputs your mind:)) boys flashing out their wash-board abs to get girls' attention, and most of the time those "girls" succumb. How do you get those abs that make girls scream? By working out, by putting your abdominal muscles under constant pressure with the aid of weights. Alright, so I guess all boys need is go to the gym and get those stone hard abs. But again there may be some males who would not consider doing it, but that is a different topic. There are many perspectives about the stone-hard abs, and before you go circuitous, hear me out.
The magazine states that when you put your abdominal muscles under pressure while working out in the weight-room, these contractions could hinder the flow of the blood. Mind you, the main reason we want strong abdominal mucles is to get up from bed in the morning, not to attract the females ( or may be). When you are contracting your muscles all the time, you are not letting the muscles let go loose. Just like when you can't think right when your mind is fried with so much stress, your abdominal muscles cannot do the regular activities when you are sucking your abs in all the time. Whatever activity we do, from bed to the beach, abdominal muscles are used all the time. One of the ways that we get strong abs is by relaxing our belly so that it could protrude outside, something against the norm in the western nations.(More power to the beer-belly posse, just kidding!). When you stick your tummy out, you are doing a great service to your body so that it can perform all the voluntary and involuntary activies without hindrance. Oh well, a little bit of yoga now and then would not hurt to strengthen your abs, but that is that.
Just like (most) girls have the fear of getting fat, boys may have the fear of getting too huge with beer-belly( or water-belly, did I just coin this term?:)) It is the inherent societal standards that we live in that makes us so much concious about our body. Good that we are consious about it, but are we overreacting? Good if we are overreacting about it, and if it primarily concerns health. Not-too-good if we just want to look too musky to attract the opposite sex?
If girls need to be a stick to be Princess Diana, do boys need wash-board abs to be George Clooney? Something to think about...
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| oys_chill |
Posted
on 13-Oct-03 07:46 AM
Yatri jyu,
long time no see........yoga ko kura garera kya yoga class yaad aayo. I thought yoga would be a very meditating class, but instead the yoga workout itself was so strenous that I had to take a nap of at least two hours after the class....eheh!
About hitting the gym, I am not so sure......Its simply amazing to see people going into extremes to lose weight and keeping yorself fit. They compromise on eating, compromise on sleeping, and compromise on every petty thing. Now, isn't eating and sleeping the primary human luxuries a human is entitled to? I'd do anything to get one full night of PEACEFUL sleep.
Then again, we are all different. I read somewhere chubbier people have nothing to lose, its emaciated ppl like me who have LOT TO GAIN. but then there are no gaining pills, but its all rite, not everyone is privileged to have a bowl of icecream at midnight :) and not worry a bit!..so things do eventually balance out!
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| Bilbo Baggins |
Posted
on 13-Oct-03 08:47 AM
Simple gal, very well written account of the high school bathroom culture. The problem is not "big" versus "skinny" ... I think its ok to be big and FIT... skinny and FIT is also a must. I think the American media missues on these issues.
BB
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