Penang -- Week 25 -- The Hair Cut

SUNDAY (continued)
During the evening I get a three-hour hairdo.  I go in not knowing what to get.  I've checked out magazines, but I have no ideas.  It's George's regular place.  He's been a few times already.  They use scissors to painstakingly sculpt his hair, strand by strand, into something amazing and they always give him a lengthy scalp massage which is including in the price.  He pays about $10 USD and comes out feeling like a million.

Now that it's finally my turn, one of the fabulously stylish male stylists (there seems to be more male ones here than female) asks in the now familiar Chinese-Malaysian staccato, "so you want cut?"
"Yes."
"And color?"
"I think so."
"I think we go bit shorter. Shorter ok?"
"Yes.  I mean, I don't know what I want.  I just know I want something very stylish." 
"Of course!" He laughs, then asks, "You want cover your grey?"
Pause with me as I soak that one in -- I've never been asked that before! (Even though I've had some grey hair since high school) "Yes, I guess so.  But I also want maybe a different color."
"Oh you want all-over color?"
"Maybe.  I like big change."
"Big change.  I think big change you get short haircut.  I don't think we change your hair color.  Actually quite nice already.  Just cover the grey and I give you some highlight if you want."
"Ok..." (No one has ever talked me out of coloring my hair before!)
"Big change..."
"Big change.  And very stylish."
He laughs again.

He quickly washes my hair, but there is no scalp massage before my cut.  Bummer.  Must be because mine will take so much longer.  He cuts and cuts and cuts.  Pauses, looks, cuts and cuts, pauses, gently grabs small locks of hair and looks, cuts some more.  Finally he blow dries.  He tells me he wants to finish the cut before doing color.  When it's totally dry, he's frustrated by the curl at the ends around my face that doesn't jibe with the bob he's constructed.  He tells me, "Your hair is quite frizzy.  I think maybe we relax it a bit.  You ever perm or color your hair?"
"Yes."
"When?"
"My last color was in December and my last perm... well it's been decades."
He laughs.  "Ok, I think we straighten, because it's quite frizzy."

It's interesting.  Never before have I been told I should straighten my hair so I can get away with a certain cut, or to make my hair look more sleek.  Usually when I ask for cuts that are best for straight hair anywhere else, I  am either told I will have to straighten it every day with an iron, go with a different cut, or else the stylist just approximates something similar with my wavy hair.  It never is all that similar, and I never end up with that ultra chic look I'm after.  It's never even occurred to me that to get the look I want, all I have to do is get my hair straightened.  It seems so obvious!  But I can't gauge whether he's a brilliant stylist for doing this, or if he simply doesn't know how to handle anything other than pin-straight Asian hair, so that's what he's giving me.

It's male hair stylist number two that comes in to straighten now.  His hair is all funky, big, and spiked out in the usual, young-Chinese-Malaysian-male way.  He has a fashionable scarf wrapped several times around his neck even though it's plenty warm in the salon.  He takes his time applying the chemical to my hair, section by section, smoothing each section down with his hands as much as he can as he goes.  And after what seems like an hour of application time, he goes back to the beginning and starts checking the progress by quickly pinging single strands and watching them to see if they curl up.  Ouch.  I should also mention that during the application process, a lock of already gooped hair flipped around and landed smack in my eye.  Yes.  I had those awful chemicals IN MY EYE!  He apologized a few times, but it seemed to me it was more because he was concerned about my discomfort than the possibility of me going blind.  Seriously, do lawsuits not happen here, because people seem to be totally fearless about things like this!  No worries though.  I rinsed my eye out, and all the make up around it, and my vision doesn't seem to be affected.

After all the hair pinging is done (also an excruciatingly lengthy process), I am taken to wash my hair.  I'm thinking I'm almost done and I can finally get out of here!  I'm oh so very wrong on that one.  He takes me back, blow dries my hair and then takes a straightening iron and straightens and straightens and straightens ad infinitum.  He's pulling and ironing, pulling and ironing.  He grabs chunks and checks to see if there is any bounce, then he pulls and straightens some more.  He really has me worried at this point.  I mean, he's styling my hair, right?  After all those chemicals am I going to have to sit and spend an hour every day straightening my hair like this?  Seriously?

After for flippin ever, he finally stops, and then some more goop is applied to my hair.  What?  I thought we were almost finished!  Nope.  This wasn't styling, apparently it was just phase two of straightening.  Is this normal?  Anyone else had their hair straightened before?

After another wash and blow dry, my scalp is screaming and my first stylist comes back and starts talking about color, "Don't want bright color, just subtle highlight?"
"Uhh... Well, I don't know, I mean I like bold color..."
"Because you already have your hair straighten I think better we just cover grey now and highlight later.  Otherwise could damage hair."
"Well, in that case why don't we wait on all of the color?"  I am eager to get out of there by now.

So I'm told to come back a couple of days before whenever I want my color, to get a special, protective, protein treatment, and the come back again for color.  They will call me to remind me.  Not sure I will anymore.  I mean if my hair color is "actually quite nice already," then why bother?  I don't have that much grey, do I?

The bill for me is much higher.  It's about $50USD.  Not bad at all for the States, but pretty pricey here.  And no color, no scalp massage.  Ah well.

The response to my 'do here has been pretty good.  Most people at our last babywearing gathering seemed to think it suited me more and someone from salsa dancing said it was so much better because it made me look younger.  So I'm finally of the age where looking younger is a good thing?  Apparently that means that otherwise I look old, eh?  In my teens, people thought I was 12, up until my mid twenties, I looked max 18.  Now, the age is showing, and thank goodness I got this hair cut so I didn't look like such an old hag.  The girl who said it looks like she's 16 by the way.

My scalp, took a couple of weeks to recover.  It's finally not hurting anymore.  I know.  I have a really sensitive scalp.  I have NEVER liked having my hair even brushed, so this was pretty tortuous.  But it was worth it,  I look CHIC, no?