Filipino News June 2017

04 JUNE 2017. ISSUE 102 | www.filipinonews.nz | email: filipinonews@xtra.co.nz | tel: 027 495 8477, 09 838 1221 | www.pinoynzlife.nz
CHIKA
MUNA
By REW SHEARER
Inna
It’s the kind of remark, unsolicited, from
a cousin, an aunt, an uncle or a friend, that
is inevitable on a return visit to the
Philippines.
“Ngek! Ang taba at itim mo na!” (“Gee,
you’ve got so chubby and dark!”)
Many are understandably offended; most
bite their tongues. The few who might call
out the rudeness find it quickly deflected
with the claim that “it’s just the Filipino
way”. And whether such bluntly personal
comments are the Filipino
way or not remains an
ongoing discussion.
But there is an additional
underlying attitude betrayed by those
comments; that thinness and fairness are
the measures of beauty and that, automatically,
bigger or darker is uglier.
It’s a beauty expectation absorbed at a
very young age in the Philippines, particularly
by girls and it’s not uncommon for
young women who are beautiful in their
own right to feel anything but: doubting and
even hating themselves because of a measurement
here, a skin-tone there, reinforced
by body-shaming disguised, in a uniquely
Filipino way, as humour – “Jokes lang!
Hihi.”
This beauty bias is endemic and brutal.
Actors, models, even politicians are criticised
mercilessly for the colour of their skin.
Any TV star who is not stick-thin will struggle
to find success in any arena other than
comedy.
Finding Beauty
in New Zealand
New Zealand, by contrast,
has a somewhat
broader – although by no
means all-embracing –
concept of beauty. Any
colour can be beautiful
and it can be argued that
there is much more liberal
acceptance of different
figures, too. Perhaps New
Zealand’s more diverse
population, in which
beauty appears in every
shape, size and hue, tends
to open the eyes of the
beholder a little wider.
Inna, 29 (pictured),
came to New Zealand as a
teenager. In the Philippines
she had been
labelled
too chubby
and
too dark
and it
showed in
her shyness.
But after a couple of
years immersed in New
Zealand with
friends of
many different
ethnicities
and being accepted
instead of criticised, she
began to see her place on
a spectrum of beauty.
Confidence in herself followed
and now Inna is, in
her own words,
“Black, chubby
and proud!
Kiwis love my
skin colour”.
Paola, 28, has
experienced the
comments from cousins,
uncles and aunts.
“When I was
in the Philippines
I did a
whitening treatment.”
But back in New
Zealand her perspective
has been res-tored. “I’m
more confident here,
because they like my
colour,” she laughs.
Others echo the sentiment.
Lyn,
a 32 year old nurse and
now naturalised Kiwi: “I
feel a lot more confident
with myself in NZ. There
are fewer unnecessary
comments thrown in relation
to my skin, weight,
sexuality and all the rest.”
Josephine, 40, feels the
heat in more ways than
one whenever she returns
to the Philippines. Rather
than suffer the remarks
and criticisms and disapproving
looks she wears
long sleeves and long
pants even on the hottest
days, saving the singlets
and shorts for New
Zealand where she feels
more comfortable baring
her skin.
For some, though, the
struggle goes on, even in
New Zealand. Anna, 22:
“You realise that nothing’s
going to change
about your body. You just
end up accepting it. I can
say that I love my colour
anytime … even though I
just accept it. They’ll
never know.”
All agreed that the narrow-minded
view of beauty
so prevalent in the
Philippines is sad and
that there is so much to be
celebrated here in New
Zealand.
Inna sums up her experience
in a sentence: “In
general, here in New
Zealand, I feel like I fit in
fine no matter what size
or colour I am.”
Perhaps acceptance is
the first step towards true
self confidence and with
it, more eyes can behold
the full spectrum of beauty.