Who should wear a bikini?

One wall of the restaurant of the lovely Mediterraneo Hotel in Dar es Salaam, was a glass window that gave an amazing view of the ocean. This Sunday afternoon my six year wise son and I were sharing a pizza and watching the world go by. I enjoyed the colourful parade of people running from the waves in their church clothes.

There was a woman who stripped down quickly to her bathing suit. She was a pale woman with big thighs and hips, flat behind with a major belly over-hang that practically met her thighs. We have similar body issues but no, you will never see me exposed in a bikini like the one she was fighting to cover her butt crack with. People stopped, stared, pointed and laughed at her. I was surprised at their behaviour. My son said, “People are looking at her.” I was aghast at the spectacle.

“I knoooow. I would never wear a bikini with a body like that,”

as soon as I heard my words, I wished I could pick them out of the air I just breathed them into. This was my perspective with a side order of my insecurities thrown in.

Only moments earlier I had told my son not to judge people and set limits on himself because during our holiday he refused to make friends with certain kids because ‘they didn’t speak English’, or ‘they were more American’ than he was.

I had admonished him for doing the very same thing I was doing to this woman. I looked at the bikini-clad woman and realised that she was clearly more comfortable with her body than I because I have been duped by Hollywood’s declaration of who can wear a bikini. My bikini standards have been limited to the vision of the first black Bond Girl — Halle Berry (pictured) in what has to be the worst movie of the franchise, Die Another Day.

This woman might have been more than the passersby have ever seen, or wanted to see, but that was not her problem. My son observed, “People are still looking at her.” I told him, that was their problem, not hers. She was a big woman wearing a bikini and clearly, she is more comfortable (and brave) in her skin than I am. Dang, sounded like the same lesson I was trying to teach my son, coming to haunt me.

Denise is an Afro-soul singer and music performance coach. [email protected]