Descriptive Essay About A Boy

The school bus is not very pleasant, and neither is riding it. While on my way home in fifth-grade one particularly humid spring afternoon, the air in the bus pressed down my chest and covered my skin in a thin layer of sweat. My glasses slid down my flat nose and my thick, dark hair eventually plastered itself to my sticky neck. The bus was a toaster. As an introverted child, there was nothing more that I wanted to do than return home, where my mother had promised dumplings and duck meat for dinner, not to mention the air-conditioning in my house. I almost didn’t notice a boy rudely shouting from behind in an effort to get my attention.
“Hey! You! Look at me!”
Turning to face him, I looked at him scornfully, taking in his pale skin that almost …show more content…
At least, he didn’t get a verbal reaction. My face contorted into a scowl, and I promptly turned back to the front with a swish of sweaty hair. Suddenly, the bus felt much hotter than it did five minutes ago; the air much heavier. As I felt my now-flushed face, I wondered what caused this boy to make this offensive joke. I knew that he told this joke to me because I was Asian, but I couldn’t understand why it was such a big deal or why he was so fixated on appearances. Was he implying that I looked ugly? Then what did I look like in his eyes? I wasn’t sure.
Of course, I had never really given too much thought to my appearance as a child, but growing older it became apparent that my Asian features stood out among my peers, most of whom were white. As I began to focus more on how I looked, I quickly learned my idea of beauty differed from the norm as well. Like any other girl, I enjoyed going out to the mall with my mother to shop for cosmetics and clothing. A fashionable woman, my mother kept up with the trends, spending time to look up reviews of the latest beauty products and never leaving the house without smelling lightly of fragrant, sweet roses. Nonetheless, she grew up in Beijing and had an Asian standard of beauty: Girls were most beautiful with pale, dewy skin, large doe eyes, and sleek, obsidian hair. A fresh, natural, and youthful look was the central dogma to Asian beauty. As we walked past huge …show more content…
“They came from spending too much time gardening in the sun when I first came to America. The sun here is so strong; I used to have clear skin when I was younger.” I rolled my eyes, but I agreed with my mother’s idea of beauty. Henceforth, I became a follower of Asian beauty trends, including having straight eyebrows, small gradient lips, and of course, light skin. Conversely, my very white friends had a vastly different idea of beauty. Tanned skin was desired, along with arched eyebrows and thick, red lips. They found it strange when I refused to go in the sun without a hat or when I used whitening face masks, but we were friends