I am borrowing the title of this post from my ingenious friend Laura, who someday plans to write a book entitled "La Guerra De Ser Guera" (the war of being a white girl). It is a fun play on words because "war" and "white girl" are so similar in Spanish; just one "r" and a different beginning pronunciation separate them ("war" is pronounced with a hard "g", but the "g" in "white girl" is pronounced like a "w": wera).
I have been wanting to write about this for quite some time. The truth is, I'm not sure what I want to say, but hopefully reflecting a bit about being a white foreigner in Mexico will help me to better understand what I feel. For starters, I dye my hair blonde. This statement is somehow just as inherently shameful in the States as it is in Mexico at the Casa de los Amigos. Right now I love my hair color, but I always feel as if I need to defend myself for being blonde, and furthermore for dyeing it that way. Blonde-ness is associated with a whole slew of sins/stereotypes: artificiality, stupidity, vanity, vapidity, falseness... the list goes on. Somewhere between Barbie and Baywatch, blondes got a bad rap, but hold the phone: if there's anything worse than a natural blonde, it is without a doubt the bottled blonde. That is exactly what I am. Are bottled blondes scoffed at for desiring blonde hair, for wanting to play into some sort of warped beauty ideal? I'm not exactly sure why, but people practically spew venom from their lips when talking about bottled blondes, a laughable existence. On the other hand, there is nothing cooler than a blonde girl who goes brunette.
Now if I felt as if I had to defend my choice to dye my hair blonde in the States, imagine how much more confusing it would become in Mexico, a country where blonde haired, blue eyed women are fetish-sized as "dolls." A country that is deeply racist; a country in which most people forever yearn to have lighter skin and look less indigenous. When I think about my reasons for dyeing my hair, my usual excuse is that it was just a change of scenery. My beloved roommate visited me over Christmas break last year, and to liven up one boring night we bought wine, brownies, and hair dye. Before that, my hair was it's natural light brown color, spruced up every once in awhile with some innocent highlights. Before that, in fact, my hair was not only brown, but SHORT... very, very short depending on the haircut. I am forever whipping out my student ID from my semester in Philadelphia in which my hair was drastically different. "Look! See! I am not shallow! I change my hair... is that such a crime?" I change my hair on a whim, from the terrible perm that I had as a freshman in college, to sophomore year when I chopped it to my chin, to junior year when I cropped it to my head, to senior year when I grew it out and dyed it. The fact that I have long, blonde hair now is mere coincidence. I could change it tomorrow! (Or so I claim...)
Anyway, this argument about constantly changing styles is harder to hold up in Mexico. It's harder to convince myself that blonde hair means nothing, when here, in fact, it means a lot. It means twice as many catcalls on the street as I used to get in Ecuador when I had brown hair. It means perhaps perpetuating a beauty ideal that makes Mexican women wish to appear more European or American. It means thinking twice before going to touch up my roots at the hair salon because most women at the Casa do not shave their legs or wear makeup, let alone dye their hair. I must admit that dyeing my hair is a choice, a choice that I am not sure that I am comfortable with. On the one hand, if I am honest with myself, part of me likes the extra attention I receive, purely for my hair color. I am not used to a lot of male attention in the States, so going from being unnoticed to achieving model status does wonders for the self esteem. On the other hand, I am repulsed by the idea that that attention would motivate me to continue dyeing my hair, especially given the cultural considerations (racism, machismo, etc). Beyond any sort of twisted motive, I genuinely enjoy my hair color right now and don't see any reason why guilt or general disapproval for (bottled) blondes should shame me to going back to my natural color. Yet, in Mexico, I can't allow myself such a dismissive attitude about it... perhaps a good experiment would be to come back to the Casa from Christmas as a reborn brunette?
Blonde-ness aside, the simple fact of being light-skinned in Mexico is a struggle, or even a "war" (to use my friend's pun). It becomes a sort of overarching, inexcapable identity which defines you. I think I mentioned before that in Latin America it is quite normal to refer to someone else as "white," "black," "skinny," "or fat," and not a day goes by that someone fails to call me "guera" when I go out to run an errand. They don't say it like a compliment or even an insult, it mostly comes out like a mere statement of truth, sometimes peaked with curiosity. In my head, it sounds like this, "What can we sell to you, white girl? You are a white girl." So much for my dream of becoming Latina. I am forever doomed to guera-ness and all of the things that it may imply about the language I speak, the money in my wallet, my country of origin, etc. I am uncomfortable with the assumed privilege and lack of anonymity. My whiteness has been an issue for me all though out college as I have traveled and struggled with wanting to shed my association with white, suburban culture. Yet, I feel it perhaps even more acutely now as I am reminded about the controversial color of my skin every time that I set foot on the street.
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