Friday, July 07, 2006

That's Shady

What do people have against optical defense? It seems like every time I wear sunglasses on the street, I get these awkward looks from strangers. I am quite sensitive to bright light. My eyes feel much more comfortable in darker conditions. So I like to wear shades everywhere I go. Unfortunately, people look at me like I'm an alien.

I find that in Hong Kong, the only people who wear sunglasses (purposeful sunglasses, not that trendy crap with yellow or purple lenses) are foreigners. Hong Kong people only wear proper shades when they do sports. Otherwise, you find them wearing ones with colors that bear less protection to the eyes. Perhaps they are worn to block out the air pollution, which actually makes sense.

So I've narrowed it down to a few reasons why people give my shades the puzzled look:
  1. They're thinking... "If he's blind, where's his cane?".
  2. They're thinking... "Those shades look horrible on that guy".
  3. They're thinking... "Is this The Matrix? Is this guy an agent?".
Does wearing shades carry a hidden stigma that I don't know about? I remember Annika Sorenstam and David Duval used to get strange comments from Golf publications about how they always "hide" under their Oakleys or Ray-Bans. Even that idiot President guy made a silly joke about a reporter who wore shades while asking him a question. Turns out that the reporter is legally blind, but Idiot President Guy didn't know it at the time.

To clear things up: Idiot President Guy didn't purposely make fun of, or insult the blind reporter. He certainly didn't know that the reporter was blind while he made those comments. It just sounds really bad when the headline, "President insults blind reporter", surfaces all over the internet.



I view it more as a "what was the point of that" kind of situation. I think a smarter President (or any public figure for that matter) would always think twice before making sly comments or attempts at humor in any situation. Idiot President Guy, aka The Resident, seems to just let words flow from his mouth without giving much thought.

Anyways, I like my shades.

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

I started to wear contacts so that I can wear shade. Now I cannot run without them.

Anonymous said...

I can't wear them, I would love to have them

Anonymous said...

thanks for letting me borrow urs! =)

Anonymous said...

When I have contacts, I wear the shades... wear them with PRIDE! -Mike

Anonymous said...

Or they could be thinking, "How can he be soooo good looking?" :D

Myself, don't wear shades. I thought I would look a bit pretentious when I do. It's just a general view of HK-ers - shades are for posers. Not to say you are a poser, but that's how it's percevied in HK.

Justin said...

Ha ha ha, thanks for the comments guys.

ahsir, you can get a pair of prescriptioned shades so you can look pretentious like the rest of us ;)

Anonymous said...

dude.. you wear shades?!?!

Justin said...

Lamp shades to be precise. I prefer the better ones from mid range furniture stores.