- I'm Ben. It's very nice to meet you.
You have a lovely daughter.
I hope you like the tattoo.
- What!
- Oh, shit.
Oh, no.
(rhythmic instrumental music)
Fuck it is probably something you'd see
tattooed on someone's inner-lip.
Perhaps no other tattoo is as easily hidden as this one.
So what type of person gets an inner-lip tattoo
and why do they get it?
- I got my lip tattooed the day after I turned 18.
- I'm obsessed with the Beatles.
I thought I was clever when I was 17.
- I was kind of spontaneous.
Just kind of my attitude at the time I think.
Like, fuck it, you know?
- To me, the under-the-lip tattoo
is just a test run for future tattoos.
- They're just funny.
- If you wanna get a tattoo
but you don't want anyone to see it, get a lip tattoo.
- Hi, Buzzfeed.
My name is Kasie, I'm 20 years old,
and I've been really wanting an inner-lip tattoo lately.
- This is Kasie, a college student and tattoo virgin.
She really wants an inner-lip tattoo
because she can hide it from her mom.
Yikes.
And I'm gonna join her every step of the way.
Oh my god.
And this is Zoey Taylor,
owner of The Warren Tattoo Shop in West Hollywood.
She's an incredible tattoo artist and all around badass.
When I think inner-lip tattoo,
I think joke, I think fuck you or fuck me or fuck my mouth.
It's always like, really raunchy.
- I think people feel a little more free to be ballsy
when they're doing something in that area
rather than almost any other area.
- The lip is one of the most hidden locations on the body,
if not the most.
I guess it would only be you and your dentist
who really sees this thing.
- Yeah, exactly.
It's never gonna be like, oh shit, it just showed.
- According to the book Inked,
tattooing the inner-lip originated in Western culture
and these tattoos are usually jokes or expletives.
However, other oral tattoos have a longer history.
People in Hawaii and India
have been tattooing their tongues for centuries.
Even today, these tattoos
are part of the cultural zeitgeist.
The film Black Panther inspired super fans
to go out and get their own.
As for the tattoo process...
- It's a mucus membrane
so there's mucus coming out through the stencil
while I'm trying to do it so you have to be really quick
and it's really, really bloody skin so it's just,
it doesn't behave like any other place you would tattoo.
- So do you get submissions and you're like,
"No thanks, it's not really my thing."
- They're kind of a pain in the butt
and if I don't have to deal with them, I don't.
- Are you willing to make an exception today
and give someone a lip tattoo?
- Yes. Fuck it.
- Fuck it.
Today, Kasie's getting her first tattoo
and it happens to be on her inner-lip
so I'm headin' over to the Kappa Delta House at UCLA
to find out what it is.
Hey. - Hello. Hi.
- How are you? - I'm so good.
- Hi, how are you doing?
- It's a nice place you got here.
- Thank you. Thank you.
- Is it yours?
- No, I live in my sorority. - I know, I'm just kidding.
- Yeah, we can head on inside now.
- Let's go.
Kasie showed me around the sorority house.
- This is kind of the main living room area.
- I tried every impress everyone by playing the piano.
(playing "Mad World" on the piano)
Then she introduced me
to one of her sisters and friends, Erica.
This is out of character for her to want a tattoo?
- One, it's really cool,
but two, it's so funny and also totally random.
Kasie's also a total sweetheart,
wants to go to nursing school.
Definitely not something you would imagine.
What are you getting?
- Originally I wanted to get kayata,
which, I searched online, means fuck it in Tagalog,
but I've been leaning maybe more towards laban lang,
which means essentially it's an expression like,
to be brave, be strong, to fight on.
Whoo! Yeah.
- Fight on?
That's USC's phrase. - No, no!
- I mean, I feel like the video's
gonna make this a lot worse.
You could just get a tattoo
and your parents would never find out but now...
(frightened music)
- Yeah, I just...
A lot of things happening right now.
- Kasie definitely seemed a little anxious
about the prospect of her parents finding out
so I asked her a little more about it.
What do you want this tattoo to mean to you?
- I don't know, I think I do risky things
when I feel things are kind of unstable.
This past summer's been the hardest summer
I've had to deal with yet.
My grandfather got really sick and fell into a coma.
My mom ended up buying a last minute plane ticket
to the Philippines and a couple hours later he passed.
Everything just started clashing and closing in on me.
It's really easy to be in a big school across the country,
to feel really small.
It would just kind of connect me in someway back home.
- Does anyone in your family have tattoos?
- No.
- You're the first? - I'm the first.
- Wow.
What do you imagine your mom's reaction would be?
- My mom doesn't even like makeup.
She doesn't like anything on my face
so having a tattoo on my face...
- Well, it's like, under your face.
- No, no, she would hate it.
- Kasie's mom, please don't hate me.
I'm so sorry,
but it's time for her to spread her wings and fly.
(laughter)
We hopped in the car
and hit the road back over to The Warren,
but first, a little rave music.
(rave music)
- Do you know anything about how long they last?
- In my experience,
they don't seem like a gradually fading thing.
- I mean, I was under the impression
that they disappeared after five years.
- I've not found that to be true.
- You known it be that they last permanently?
- I've known people for 15 years
who still have the same lookin' lip tattoo
and it hasn't changed.
- Does that change your way of thinking about this at all?
- We're you hoping it was temporary?
- It still hasn't really hit me yet
that this is gonna happen.
Do you want this to stay
or do you want it to disappear after five years?
- She like, "I'm out."
- It's totally up to you.
- I'm okay with that.
- All right, we're all good?
- Yeah. - Submit.
- Submit, wow.
- L-A-B-A-N,
and then a space,
and then L-A-N-G.
(relaxed instrumental music)
- Hold it while I get the edges.
(relaxed instrumental music)
- There's no turning back after this point.
You sure?
(tattoo machine buzzing)
(relaxed instrumental music)
10 being the most painful, how painful is it right now?
Seven? Six or seven.
(relaxed instrumental music)
Are we done? - Yeah.
- You ready to see your first ink?
- Yeah, I wanna see it.
- Go ahead.
- Oh my gosh, you're kidding me.
So cool.
Yeah, this is exactly what I wanted.
- It was awesome seeing how pumped Kasie was
about her first ink.
She loved it so much actually
that she did something none of us expected.
Oh, yeah.
No, I love it.
I don't care what she thinks at this point.
- You don't? - Maybe later.
But I'm just on a rush right now.
Momma.
- What's up? What's up, hun?
- What's up, boy?
What are you doing, Momma?
- Oh, not much.
- Yeah, I've just been studying all day,
but I wanna show you something.
- Okay. - Okay, ready?
- Look.
- Ew.
- Ew?
- It say's laban lang.
- Laban lang?
That's a lot of words.
- Yeah, that's two words, Momma.
It's hidden.
Only me and you can see it, Momma.
- Momma, no, I don't laugh like that.
- Hello.
I'm partly responsible for this.
Oh, shit.
Oh, no.
- This is the artist, Momma.
- Hello.
- It's cursive.
It's well done.
- Aw, Mommy.
I wanna hug you.
Okay, so now I can get more, yeah?
- I love you very, very much.
- Bye.
Yes!
- She is so sweet.
- I'm so blown away about how she reacted.
- Me too. - Yeah.
- At the end of the day,
I think my mom always trusts my judgment on things.
- Whether it's a first foray into tattoos,
a spontaneous moment with friends or something deeper,
at the end of the day, like all tattoos,
it is what you make it.
In other words, fuck it.
(upbeat electronic music)