Happy Being Brown

Now I ask you, what kind of a race are we? I meant us, Indians, when I meant 'we'. I call us a race because, we have so much mixed blood and we don't belong to one particular race. We are a bloody 'mongrel race'.  

And there is one particular trait that is unique only to us. I mean what kind of people, are racist against their own. When we notice people darker than our own, we start ridiculing them, they become the butt of our jokes and we also have special names for them, for example, kaalu, kaalia...

I would have never realised it myself, until I went through the marriage market. It was fine that I was a pretty girl, it was fine that I was an engineering graduate, it was fine I was working, it was fine my parents had money, it was fine I would be married off grandly with enough gold and property, but...no, no, no, make that a BIG BUT!

"But the girl is a little dark, no?” the aunty would say, and the uncle would nod in agreement. Only their son would be staring with longing in his eyes. Only he would not have the guts to offend his folks, but hey who wants to marry a blind bat, who can't see beyond my colour.

And why I would I marry someone who is bald, has a bad nose, has a big forehead, and well who is darker than me. Well go ahead and have your prejudice, I will rightfully have mine as well.

It was then my mother suddenly discovered, I needed to become fair. So the tryst began, starting with lime juice, turmeric, honey, cream, almond paste, milk, curd, tomato juice, grated potato, mashed papaya, you name it, I have put it on my skin, and then she discovered the chemical bleaches...

Until we discovered something. I come from a healthy stock of dark South Indians, and you know what means...tee hee...I would revert back to being brown in a few weeks...So I would be wheat coloured a few weeks and cinnamon coloured a few weeks. And no I am not black or brown (how dare you) I am warm honey-toned or a spicy cinnamon colour...sigh what I can say...

There is a fairness cream,

there is a whitening cream,

there is a bleach,

there is a whitening powder,

there is a whitening this and a fairness that.

And now you are calling it radiance something.

I don’t care for your propaganda

and nor your racist ways.

It is funny that you are Indian.

That you are cream and I am chocolate!

It is funny that the pot

wants to call the kettle black.

You want ME to change

because I am brown.

But you can’t make me

feel ashamed of

this delicious cinnamon skin,

and you can’t make me hate for

who I am.