Different points of view can be more than skin deep

A lot of people (myself included) appreciate having a golden-brown tan. Young women have spent hours in the sun, stretched into tanning beds or stood tall in spray-tan vestibules.

This isn’t surprising — in the United States anyway. I was recently sitting beside a young Filipino woman who eagerly struck up a conversation with me, despite saying that her English was terrible — which didn’t seem that way to me at all.

“I like my job,” the massage therapist said. “I don’t have to be outside.”

Well, sure, it’s hot here. But that wasn’t her issue.

“I stay out of the sun as much as I can,” she said, then pointed to my skin with a coveting finger. I did the same to her tanned arm. I told her how people in the States like a tan — they’ll do a lot to get it, like by putting on tanning lotions or risking a sunburn.

In the Philippines, it’s easy to find products or methods to lighten the color of skin. (Photo by Taylor Danser)

Here, they make the effort and buy products to be paler. Soaps and lotions fill some aisles in supermarkets, promising a whitening effect. Spas have “skin-lightening procedures” such as body bleaching. Before you go thinking how dangerous that sounds, think about the wonderful, healthy benefits from a tanning bed. A quick google search on either whitening products/procedures and tanning efforts show that there are risks of long-term damages.

We sat there looking at each other, clearly not understanding the viewpoint of the other. Who knew that on the other side of the world, such desires could be so opposite?