Tattoos

Just behind a large plate glass window, Cazzie Luz is getting inked. A weekend visitor to Vegas, Luz is getting the University of Arizona's "A" logo tattooed onto his right leg. There's no garish neon sign in the window announcing the shop is "Open." The bright lights -- far stronger than the 40-watt bulbs one might expect to find -- make that obvious. Also missing are the bongs and rolling papers found in seedier tattoo parlors.

Bashfulness and bravery came together in a curious marriage as Ronny Turiaf strolled into a tattoo parlor in Spokane, Wash. Turiaf, a Laker now and a Gonzaga Bulldog then, did not exactly know what to expect but knew it was for him. He received his first tattoo five years ago. He left that parlor $100 shorter in cash and with the motto "Never Lose Faith" on his back.

Re "LAFD tattoo coverup muddles real mission," Column, June 21 Los Angeles Fire Department brass and our union have haggled for many years over tattoos and other issues. But if a fire engine stopped in front of your burning home, you would see little or nothing on any of the firefighters to tell what race or sex they are, let alone the tattoos they may have. All you would see is well-covered bodies working to save lives and property belonging to someone they don't know. But if a firefighter visits the school of Sandy Banks' young daughter, does he have her full attention as she wonders whether his tattoos are a tribute to family, fallen firefighters or an off-duty lifestyle?

'Mom, Dad, can I get a tattoo?" That's a hot-button issue for many parents. They panic at the thought of their teenager being inked -- scarred! -- for life at a still tender age. If, however, the question is posed in Hawaii, the parents' reaction may be quite different. In the 50th state, tattoos are part of the culture, having been introduced centuries ago by early voyagers from other Polynesian islands. Today, tattoo parlors are just about as prolific as souvenir shops.

The technique of applying tattoos with an electric needle is relatively new. For centuries, Hawaiians used a cruder -- and far more painful -- method. A sharpened bone or shell was tied to a stick and then dipped in ink made from the kukui nut. The point was then hammered against the body to impregnate the skin. The pain was, understandably, intense. "It's, like, 10 times worse than having it done by machine," says Keeaumoku Kapu, whose chest bears a tattoo applied the traditional way.

The anniversary of Marine Cpl. Brian R. St. Germain's death in Iraq was approaching, and Gunnery Sgt. Jason Alderman was making sure his buddy would never be forgotten. He was getting a tattoo in his honor. The design was one that Alderman had chosen after looking at a Marine-themed website, www.grunt.com.

The ghastly procession of decapitated corpses and mutilated bodies that has defined death in Iraq drove Firas Adil Saadi to do something that was once the province of convicts and degenerates here: He got a tattoo. The 28-year-old Shiite Muslim now has a marking on his right shoulder so his family may avoid the despair of not being able to identify his remains. In ornate Arabic calligraphy, it says "My brother Husam," after a cousin who suffered such a fate.

Last year Justin Miloro had to wear long sleeves to conceal the Buddha curling around his left forearm and the yellow-orange sun rays on his right. Pants covered the depiction of Earth on one leg and wings on the other. The sun spreading across his back was under wraps. The plugs in his earlobes were obscured by bandages. "I thought it was really silly," Miloro recalled, "worse than seeing the tattoos."

It's a canvas of sorts, one threaded through with blue veins, nasty bruises, an explosion of hatch-marks that, upon closer inspection, turn out to be scars. It's skin -- but that's just one layer of a story. Laid over that, across the spread of a back, is an elaborate tattoo: A gun sunk into earth, a helmet resting on top, empty boots tossed alongside. Dog tags dangle from the sides, spelling out in bold uppercase "Never forget.

What does Angelina Jolie have in common with Josef Stalin and Thomas Edison as well as 2 out of every 5 Americans between the ages of 26 and 40? They all have or had tattoos. Once seen as a silent cry of rebellion, tattoos now possess a status so firmly mainstream that advertisers are using them to market products as diverse as tires, shoes, wine and energy drinks. That has its downside, though.