Screening process

(More published stuff...)

I recently read that hippo sweat--a deep red, viscous liquid--may be the best sunscreen ever. While I couldn’t possibly find it on store shelves, I did smile to myself when I stood at a beauty counter at the mall recently listening to a young woman’s spiel on SPF, sun-shield and more. I even found myself reading the list of ingredients on a tube of sunblock to see if it contained the miracle stuff, knowing full well that I would only see chemical names and never know where the molecules came from.

But I was only following my dermatologist’s advice. For years, like most brown-skinned Indian women, I never thought about shielding my skin from the sun, until the day I found myself burning while my white girlfriends basted in tanning oil glowed a gentle gold. Sun-sensitive, the dermatologist declared, mandating sunscreen at least, if sunblock (which has SPF 30 and more) was not close at hand. Use it even when you are working at the computer, the monitor is a source of ultraviolet rays that can dangerously harm your skin. Use at least 30 SPF (aka sun protection factor) and reapply it every couple of hours, more often when you are swimming or gymming or otherwise very sweaty. I do remember to follow the advice quite regularly, which explains why my skin has not aged as much as I have.

Which explains why I was shopping for sun protection. My favourite Clinique City Block was not available anywhere and I needed an alternative. I started at Beauty Centre, then trotted around the corner to Beauty Palace, both in Crawford Market. I gazed at the range of Banana Boat products, from SPF 15 to 60, and sniffed happily at the unguents that reminded me of the mixed fruit jams I relished when I was a child, the scents redolent with pineapple, coconut and sweet berries. Safe for children the tubes declared, but sensitive skin does not like strong smells, so I wandered away. The Lakme counter at a department store in Churchgate displayed a range that was packaged in attractive gold-orange containers, and the Lotus Herbals products were touted with as much enthusiasm, as were Vichy (for the very healthy budget), Ayur, Garnier, Shahnaz Herbal, Neutrogena, Fair and Lovely, Himalaya, Biotique, Nivea and VLCC.

Thoroughly confused and fleeing the attentions of all these salespeople at their counters, I headed for a well-known chemist store on Queen’s Road. The chappie in charge offered me Z-cote, a zinc oxide product that would give me the protection that the Australian cricketers used, he told me solemnly, without the odd appearance of the white mask usually seen in zinc or titanium oxide blocks. Or try Lumicare, he said, it is quite good, for sensitive skin. A little research told me that I could have saved myself a lot of trouble and sun exposure and called my friendly neighbourhood representative to get myself Avon, Oriflame or Aviance products. With all this, from the cheapest at about Rs 150, to the most expensive at about Rs 3,000, I could make my dermatologist and my skin very happy.

But I never found anything with hippo sweat in it. The miracle is yet to be made available!