The World in Colour

The world would be dull if it didn’t have colour. But I wonder how often we really enjoy colours without interpreting them in some way. Anthropologists have tried to study how strongly our senses are influenced by the culture we were born into. Tough question, that one. Is your red as vivid as mine or is mine dull compared to yours? Do we all see the same colours or do our cultures select them for us? Colours matter, even if you don’t want them to. This is certainly true when it comes to skin colour. One of the odd things about living in Davao is that you really stick out as a white person. I am getting used to it, but when I’m in the company of Filipinos they always draw my attention to the many heads turning my way and the many pairs of eyes seeking mine. It would be interesting to study the significance of the colour ‘white’ in the Philippines. White is ‘puti’ in Cebuano and as far as Filipinos are concerned, puti is beautiful. You would find 30-foot billboards advertising skin whitening creams, young Filipinas going out of their ways to stay out of the sun and mothers proudly smiling when their child is said to be ‘puti kaayo’ (very white). It is certainly strange to be in a city where my skin colour is so rarely seen and so quickly noticed. There is a sting to that, of course. On the one hand, there are certain advantages to being white. It is easy to make connections with important people (which I am not really comfortable with doing, by the way). But sometimes I wonder if for every door that opens there isn’t also one that closes at the same time… And there is always that tricky question: what does ‘white’ really mean in the Philippines?

"I am white thanks to Silka!"