Ultimate Ugly Pic

Two days left in February.

Two days left to post ugly pictures.

Here’s the ultimate ugly pic. Taken four years ago for my Croatian passport.

I have no explanation for it. I don’t remember looking THAT ugly, but maybe I was in denial.

And as long as we're on the subject of ID photos...

ID photos are serious stuff in Taiwan, especially to women. Sure, everywhere around the world women like to look good on their passports and driver's licenses, but the level of importance seems to be raised a couple of notches here in Taiwan.

This new law came out recently, dictating stricter rules for identification documents photos. "All five organs must be clearly visible", to paraphrase the regulation. I've tried to figure out which 5 organs those could be: eyes, nose, ears, mouth... one is missing. I don't know which other one they mean.
Because suddenly everyone needed new ID photos, our company arranged for a professional photographer to come to the office and get everyone new photos at a reasonable price. I didn't need it, but all my female colleagues were getting very excited over it, so I wanted to see what the fuss was all about.

Two weeks later we all got our little envelopes with about 10 prints and a digital version on a CD. We all burst out laughing at the result. Here's mine. The Freaky Manequin photo.

Others' were no better than mine. At first, we couldn't figure out what was so weird about them. Then I realized... they retouched them. All of them. With mine, they put make up on my lips and cheeks. Tidied up my hair (yes, this is the tidy version) and erased the contours of my nose in the area between my eyes! Can you believe it? That's why my eyes look further apart then they should be.

Needless to say, I won't be using this photo for any ID.

The best use found for it so far: My friend Joyce shows it to her students to scare them with the creepy WaiGuoRen.