Honolulu Star-Advertiser © Susan Scott
July 27, 1998
A few days ago, I drove to Kailua to engage in one my favorite ocean activities: beach walking. I like doing this because I can get some exercise, scan the sand for marine treasures and people-watch, all at the same time. This pleasant combination always makes me feel great about living in Hawaii.
This time, however, I found myself preoccupied with something I never noticed before: the skimpy dress of so many beach-goers. As I walked, bare bottoms, bouncing breasts and rolling tummies continually caught my attention.
At first, I was shocked by this blatant display of naked flesh. Then, I was shocked that I was shocked.
Since when did you get so prudish? I asked myself, remembering countless episodes of skinny-dipping with friends. Then I realized what was going on: I was reacting to my recent month in Pakistan, where the national religion of Islam requires covering the body. This is especially true for women, whose heads, faces and bodies, from wrists to ankles, are wrapped in fabric.
It’s amazing how quickly this custom made me feel self-conscious. In just a couple of plane flights, I went from strolling down the beach in a tank suit to being embarrassed when I forgot to button the collar of my long-sleeved blouse. And when my ankle-length skirt billowed up, even slightly, in the breeze? It felt scandalous.
This covering-up routine is a tough convention to follow in a country were summer temperatures often soar over 100 degrees and the humidity is about the same. But because I think that ignoring customs of other cultures is rude, I draped myself in loose clothes, wrapped my head in a scarf and sweated it out.
This get-up was quite a switch from my dive trip to Thailand’s Pi Pi Island about six months ago. That area is hot too, but not much covering up of bodies was going on there. Instead, several resort guests spent most of the week at the beach naked. Well, nearly naked. Both men and women swam, snorkeled and sunbathed wearing only the bottoms of string bikinis, so small I wondered why they even bothered.
I found this shocking, too, but not for reasons of modesty. These oversunned Europeans had skin the texture of an old shoe. Yet, day after day, there they were, thighs, bellies, buttocks and breasts spread out in the sun like drying apricots.
I wondered if the words “skin cancer” meant anything to these people.
I didn’t feel a cultural obligation to copy this particular Thai resort attire — except once, and that was an emergency.
I was snorkeling in front of the resort in about two feet of water when a goby swam down the front of my one-piece swimming suit. I didn’t realize the fish was there until it began struggling to get out and ended up wiggling around my waist.
I would like to report that I calmly reached down and released the little fish, but it’s not so. You see, I didn’t know what was in there, only that it was something alive and extremely active.
So I did what any normal person would do: jump around like a maniac while unbuttoning my neck-high suit and yanking if off.
Only when I saw the goby hit the water and disappear did I realize I was standing on a bustling beach with my swimming suit hanging from my waist. Lucky I wasn’t in Pakistan.
Last week at Kailua Beach, my priggish mood soon left me, and I enjoyed watching people, dressed in whatever they felt like wearing, having fun at the beach. Later, I found some lovely gooseneck barnacles and an enormous ghost crab running with the waves.
Hawaii is a great place to live.