A "Haircut" to Remember
Before I left for China, my hair was getting pretty shaggy. My mom asked me, "Are you going to get a haircut here so that you don't have to worry about it there?" I told her that we'll just have to see how the Chinese do haircuts, and boy am I glad I did. First off, I walked into the shop (pictured) around 1:00. I figured it would be less busy. The thing about Chinese salons is that they get busy around 9:00 pm. I walked by the other night at just after 11:00 pm, and they're still cranking 'em out. I soon learned out why. After a muddled conversation about what I wanted done, I just told them "the usual" and that I just wanted my hair shortened and thinned all around. So first this very nice girl sits me down. She squirts what seemed like a quarter of a pound of shampoo into my hair. I'm thinking "I just came for a haircut." Next she starts rubbing it in until the top of my head is one big poof of suds. She then transitions into a full on head massage. I've never really had a real one, but this one sure was good. She even did some weird stuff like hard knocking on my skull, as if to see if I actually had some American brains in there. After about 5 minutes of that, she transports me over to this sink, where I get to lay down. She runs warm water all through my hair, then after a few minutes of that takes me back to the chair and dries my hair. Then she tells me to put my hands on the counter in front of me, with my head close. She gives me a complete back massage, including hard pounding and a deep massage in my neck and shoulders. Almost a half hour in I finally get to see the stylist--a very indie looking guy who starts cutting my hair with his mp3 player headphones in. For some reason it didn't bother me. Maybe because I was in this subdued state of delight. The only word I knew how to describe what I wanted was "duan", which means "short". With this little info, he took it upon himself to just do whatever the hell he wanted with my hair--and it actually turned out okay. Afterwards, I went back with the girl, she put some conditioner (I think) in my hair, did the whole head massage routine, rinse, back massage routine, and then I went back to the stylist. He did some final cuts, and then gelled it up to how he saw fit. After over an hour of being in there, I walked out, not really knowing what happened. All I knew is that I hope my hair grows enough to get it cut again. And to think, all that for under $2! That is what I call a bargain.