Getting Mehndi/Henna as a Spaniard

So I've always wanted to try to make myself a henna tattoo, since I adore the intricate designs and so on, but suddenly I had a thought:

Am I doing the thing?

I have friends from all over the world, and I do know what culture aproppriation is, since, well, I am from Spain. My culture is constantly misinterpreted and done wrong on American TV shows where, aparently, either you're Mexican or you're not Spanish. Or if you introduce yourself as from Spain, people yell "tacos" and "sombrero" at me which is, let me tell you, absolutely stupid to do.

Just because I am a First World country doesn't mean we don't get the culture aproppriation thing. Have you ever seen a British walking around in a toreador costume? It's degrading. It's ridiculous. It hurts me and it offends me and it makes me think that people only know my country for a sadistic and disgusting tradition such as bullfighting or for Hernando Cortés. Like, why would you even talk to me about what my ancestors have done more than a hundred years ago? You think I'm fucking proud of destroying so many human lives? Fucking Christ.

So this friend and I began to talk aput the implications of me getting henna. First of all, she told me: "Well, mehndi is mainly for women. Men are known to wear it on auspicious occasions, but it's kinda rare." And I got that, honestly, but gender roles and eat my sweet trans ass for once. I can paint my nails and have mehndi if I want.

And then came the culture thing. She was like "Also, uh...you're Spanish."

"Yeah, so?"

"Dude, henna is Arabic. Jewish. Indian. You can't do that because it's culture aproppriation."

And that's when I began to laugh.

Because fuck you all very much, you don't know shit about Spain. Culture proppriation? Me? I'M FROM THE SOUTH OF SPAIN. This is not culture aproppriation, for fuck's sake, half my culture is made of islam! Did you know Spain was ruled OVER A CENTURY by Arabs? No? Well, you need to study a lot more history, because Spain used to be called a few centuries ago 'Al Andalus'. Bam. History facts on your face.

Half our people are muslim. Islam rules here a lot. Why do you think we are mainly made of PoC? Hispanic people are dark skinned and I'm light skinned with blue eyes and blond hair because my great great grandfather passed some mad British genes to me. The south of Spain is known for such a wide variety of Arab culture and I'm not even kidding. My grandmother from my father's side was born in Morocco. My mom studied in Granada. Granada, y'know, where the great palace of La Alhambra is? No? Yes.

So this group of friends who live in the States came up to me and were like "But you're not 100% Arab, you were raised by Christians and you don't even know the language!" of course not. There are so many kinds of henna, don't you know? Indian henna. Moroccan henna. Jewish henna. CHRISTIAN HENNA.

People get so caught up in this 'culture aproppriation' thing and I get it. I do. When you see this white, American ignorant asshole wearing a headset made of plastic it makes Native Americans feels like a joke, like when I see a little girl dressing up in a gypsy dress that goes to her knees. HER KNEES. It's degrading. But don't call out on people who are not mocking it, but thriving in it. I'm not dressing up in henna. I'm learning about it, about its meanings and the people that do it and made it and love it. 

My friend, almost Moroccan, basically - well, he's so pumped about this. He's been wanting to get a mehndi tatoo for a while but he can't draw for shit, so he asked me to do it. I'm excited.

If you don't know anything about my country, don't assume I'm aproppriating on something. You may be surprised.