The ugliest woman on earth

I remember my mother’s comments on the colour of my skin. She seemed to be angry that I did not inherit the shade of her skin and instead betrayed her by dipping into the genetic pool of my father’s side. My beautiful, dark, father who was shamed his entire life for his glorious black skin, had probably internalized this colorism. He said to me one day after seeing me play with my friends ,”You are the darkest person in your friend group. Sabse Kaala.” I told my friends I had a crush on a guy in my class. He was the class clown. My friends felt obliged to inform him of my crush. I asked them the next day,”What did he say?” They told me,” He said you are so dark that it looks like you have been in a house fire.” I felt my spirit float up from my body and look down at the scene below. I was 14 then. And it would be a long time before my spirit would land back in my body. It was exhausting to go through life with the same cassette tape playing in a loop for the next 18 years. I am ugly. I am unlovable. And no one can ever truly love me. At 21, after moving cities and losing oodles of weight by chance, I found myself at the center of men’s attention. It felt like the universe was finally paying its dues. It had given me my ugly duckling transfomation. “I refuse to join any club that would have me as a member.” says a famous qoute by Groucho Marx. Ofcourse, there was something wrong with these men who find me attractive. Can’t they see? I am ugly. I am unlovable. They can never truly love me. In my mid-20s, after moving cities again and losing oodles of weight (this time on purpose), I became exotic. The same shade of skin for which I was shamed all my life had become desirable. “Ah”, I said to myself, “It’s a fetish that these men have.” But in my head I knew. I am ugly. I am unlovable. No one can ever truly love me. I met a kind, hippie man on New Year’s in Goa. This was the new year when news had just started coming in of a virus which was spreading through the world. The kind, hippie man was into spirituality, into astrology and into Ayurveda. He spoke about which oil he preferred to use to oil his long hair which he tied in a man bun. His way of being in his feminine both fascinated and infuriated me. I came back to Dubai and went about my work. The whole world came to a standstill soon. I slowly started reading about energy, being an empath, and boundaries. I was curious about all the stuff the kind, hippie man had spoken about. A whole world opened up for me. The world of softening into the feminine, pilgrimages to portal places and sacred quests. Slowly my spirit found its way back to my body. In my 30s now, my body speaks to me. I love the shade of my skin – the brown of fresh mud after the rains, the brown of chocolate melting on warm fingers and the brown of tree bark breathing in the sun. I may have been the ugliest woman on earth for 18 years. But I have the rest of my life to live from my beautiful body.