A Hairy Topic

So, I had taken notice of the fact that here in Ghana, women do not seem to shave their legs. I decided to ask Lawrence about this the other day so I said, "Hey Lawrence, I noticed some women here don't shave their legs, is this a cultural thing or was it just those few women?" He responded that no, women here no not shave their legs and he wasn't sure why they would. This sparked a short discussion that both of us found extremely amusing.

When he finally picked up on the fact that I was surprised that women here did not shave, he looked at me with a slightly horrified look, then glanced at my legs and said, "you do?!".

"Of course I shave my legs Lawrence if I didn't, they would be covered in hair."-me

"Yes, but why remove it, this would be a beautiful thing. I wish I had more hair on my legs!"- Lawrence as he lifts his pant leg to show me quite a lot of hair, apparently not enough in his eyes.

"But Lawrence, it would be gross, I have a lot of hair. We do not find this attractive. Most women in the United States remove the hair from their legs."-me

"Oh but why? Many women here are admired for having lots of hair on their arms and legs. In fact, if you were to let it grow back you would get many marriage proposals."- Lawrence

At this point I am laughing quite hard at the idea of being covered in black hairs and having men admire it to the point that they would ask me to marry them.

"Lawrence, our volunteers from the US would think it disgusting if they arrive in Ghana and find that I have hair all over my legs."-me.

He did not understand what they would find disturbing about this and seemed quite taken aback that I would want to remove my beautiful leg hair. This led to us comparing arms. Lawrence has almost no hair on his arms at all, unfortunately, I do. I explained that I would like to have as little hair on his arms as he does. He looked at me sadly and said, "I wish I had hair like yours on my arms, you have some very nice hairs, I need more." Of course this comment sparked another round of laughter.

I guess some things are as they say. Beauty lies in the eye of the beholder.