THE FLAVOR

THE FLAVOR.

image ciattion: ifyougiveablondeakitchen.com

When you are a kid, you are not exposed to all the flavors that can exist. It is vanilla and chocolate. And if you are fancy, strawberry. It never goes beyond that. For some unknown reason, children are limited to just those three flavors. Wafers, Ice-Cream and even Chupa-Chups lollipop. As though there was a general meeting somewhere and everyone decided that these three flavors are the only relevant ones. As such, these choices start to reflect in everyday life. We look for Vanilla, Chocolate and Strawberry in everything. 

Naturally we will start to do that with people. People were vanilla, chocolate or strawberry. Vanilla are the light skinned mellow ones. Chocolate were the dark and rugged ones and strawberries were those girly girls that like pink and frills and tutus and glitters and gloss and had red lips and somehow were not beautiful but very attractive because they looked neat and clean and new. We all wanted to be friends with a strawberry at some point.

Maybe it was slavery or apartheid or racism. But because vanillas are erroneously represented with white or a color close to it, they were treated with a higher regard. Just so you know, VANILLA PODS ARE DARK BROWN! Even today at this moment, if you want to be safe, you go for vanilla. Whatever it is. It can never be wrong or that bad. Like the white person. Somehow always ahead in attractive ways. You question something offered to you by a dark person but a white thing is automatically vindicated by its color.

Subsequently, you assume you want vanilla because it is safe, respected, understood, because it has pioneer advantage as the number one flavor. The vanilla girl always got attention. She could be not smart or unkind but because she is light skinned, it is somehow okay. All your female friends have a crush on the vanilla guy and it’s so discouraging like “why are there so many applicants? I am average how will this wonderful vanilla ever pick me when I am not even vanilla?” It leaves this unanswered question.

We judge first with our eyes because eyes are the first to respond to the environment. Usually. We like what we see. We don’t even explore. A person is vanilla, that’s the one to want. And you can want them for millions of years just because of their 'vanilla-ness.' What you see has clouded the rest of your senses. And sometimes our senses are so clouded that even when they open their mouth and rubbish comes out, we still want them. Even when they don’t smell that good, we still want them. Even when they hurt us and bruise us, we still want them. Just so we can say yes, I have a vanilla too. I have won. I have arrived.

I never saw myself with anyone but vanilla. The clean, tall, lean and very fair boy. Perfect smile, perfect score. In my dreams and childish fantasies, the boys or guys were always fair. Because that is what romance stupidly taught us. Everyone in romantic stories is by chance good looking. And the number one element of beauty is in fairness. They put that shit in Snow White. The very first Disney Princess. Fairest of them all. In that context, fair is not only an element of beauty. Fair has somehow become beauty. Such misleading concepts. (tsk-tsk.)

In my stories, the heroine’s lover was always fair. Because it’s easy. It is the most likely believable point. The reader expects the wonderful actor or the sexy hero to be fair so you give it to them. It was so until I was confronted with a vanilla. He was vanilla in all aspects. Cool, calm, and sweet. He was an unwrapped present. Fair, the kind with pink lips and he was smart. Just the way I like them. Or so I thought. I stared at him as he spoke to me and I was not nervous at all. I usually am when there is a possibility of me having feelings. This time I wasn’t. The pockets were full. Yet, I wasn’t swayed. “What is wrong with me?” I wondered.

Then I met another. This one was dark. The darkest I have ever been interested in. He was chocolate in all shades and I wanted a bite. Hell, I wanted him whole. His skin was so dark and smooth and his lips were darker. No one imagines kissing dark lips. Yet, I found myself doing so. And I knew just what they would taste like. Dark chocolate. The chocolate that we all avoid even though it’s good for our heart. It is acquired taste. Like his lips. I would be skeptical, then I will want nothing else.

He is perfectly formed. The shoulders, the arms the body. He sounds like how you would expect chocolate to sound, should it ever speak. Dark and foreign. And it fits for he is from a land so far away. A land I have never heard of, before him. Perhaps it is the African version of Willie Wonka’s Chocolate Factory. A place where they manufacture many of him. Maybe there are others like him and maybe I have a chance? But I have a sinking feeling he is a limited edition. Possibly the only edition.

 Have you ever seen a Chocolatier at work? Raking the melted cocoa on a slab in a fluid motion, the chocolate dripping to form a perfect glossy pool of delicious goodness? That’s how I imagine he was made. How can vanilla ever compare?