The beach

On Saturday, the ladies and I went to Long Beach to beat the heat wave. I wore a bikini for the first time in my life. My parents are super liberal, but wearing a bikini was always considered a no-no, something only "Americans" did (by the way, I am an American!). At the beach, after situating ourselves, I pulled my shirt off and took off my shorts and: voila! History was made with a little black Red Carter number. It didn't make me as self-conscious as I thought it would. It was definitely much harder to actually do activity in though--I flashed everyone (full boob!) at least three times, thanks to the ocean waves. Every time a wave hit me, my top flew off. I finally learned to just hold my chest every time a wave came by, considerably immobilized. So the question is: "liberalization"? or not?


When I was in Iran in 2001, we went up to the Caspian Sea for a little getaway, an area which we call "the North" in Iran (or "Shomal" in Farsi--the equivalent of saying, "We're going to the Hamptons!" in New York). The weirdest part about Shomal though is that... you can't really use the beach. We arrived at the beach wearing full-length black overcoats and dark headscarves (as per the law). The sea was divided with this huge plastic sheet: one side for the women, and the non-enclosed side for the men. As a woman, I had to stand in line to go into the section of the beach that was covered by this huge plastic barrier. The "bouncers" at the entrance consisted of gnarled old ladies in full chadors who chastised anyone with an inch of flesh showing. Once inside the enclosure however, it was Girls Gone Wild--Islamic Style. In their vast resentment, the women gave no heed to what they looked like. They let it all hang out. Half of them went naked because they figured "who really cares?" (and I'm not talking in a sexy way, I'm talking we-are-savages-who-have-no-regard-for-our-bodies kind of way). Some of them just walked into the water with their clothes on. Everybody was acting like they were on drugs, screaming wildly in reckless abandon. 


On my way exiting the beach, I forgot to put on my socks (people: socks? sand? really?!) and I was wearing those hideous sandals that flourished in the Pacific Northwest of the U.S. for a while (a.k.a. Tevas). The bouncer hag at the entrance to the women's beach pointed at me and raised the alarm. Suddenly, the crows were descending on me, yelling. I felt my heart pounding through my overcoat and the fear crawl up my spine. I didn't want to go to jail! So I ran as fast as I could, and I didn't turn back. I'd heard all the horror stories before and I wasn't going to wait till one of them caught up to me to give me a verdict. I hid behind a building where I could put on my sandy socks and walked the rest of the way back to our rented villa alone, boys jeering at me. Later on, we would all gather back at our villa and laugh at the story of how I out-ran the beach police, but it was a seriously disturbing moment and one that still sticks with me.


Last weekend, wearing my bikini for the first time, I waded into the cold water, thankful to cool off in the extreme heat. Nasty old men were looking at me, checking out my chest, waiting for the next wave so I'd be dis-robed. I held my bikini top by crossing my arms, folding into myself to be as invisible as possible. That wasn't necessarily comfortable either, and I could see the germ of why a country might have a womens-only beach. But still, ultimately, on this day it was my choice what to wear. Not the hag bouncers on the Caspian Sea. Not my parents who come from a different reality but meant well. 


Later on Long Beach, I studied our pile of gossip magazines, the spreads on "hottest beach bodies." Me and my girlfriends quibbled on so-and-so's abs and so-and-so's boob job and the first inkling of it began: But what if it wasn't my choice to wear the bikini? What if I only thought it was my choice and I was doing it only because my peers were, because everyone in the media wore one, because of this silly magazine? I returned home that night with the coveted bikini-line tan, no closer to a conclusion except that my one-piece swimsuit would be taking a permanent hiatus.