Play the Game of Life
Ryan Petersen's Blog

Barbershops are not a place I will add to my list of places to demonstrate your courage in learning a language. The risks are just too high.

It's been some months and it was getting a little shaggy. My Chinese teacher got a haircut over the weekend, so when I told him I was afraid to get my haircut by a Chinese barber he laughed at me. "What could go wrong?" was basically his message. So, after being ridiculed in class I decided to get up the courage and brave a Chinese barbershop.

As with most events in my life, there was very little planning involved in this. The strategy was this: walk around aimlessly till I find a guy who looks like he might be gay cutting someone's hair. Surprisingly this only took about 5 minutes, as there was a potentially homosexual barber just around the corner from my apartment.

I made one pass to review the situation then told myself to just go for it. Within 5 minutes several things struck me as quite different from American barbershops. First, they don't have alcohol or whatever is in those jars where they keep the combs. The guy just picked the comb off the table, kinda tapped out the last person's hair and began using it on me. I thought, okay, I'm in China; I can handle a little Chinese hair mixed in with my own. The second thing that hit me is they don't have guards on their razors. This was a devastating blow to my haircut strategy, since I had planned on saying "number 4" and pointing to the clippers.

Now I was in over my head. Sitting in the chair, with the towel rapped around me there was no turning back. Yet I had no chance of describing how I wanted my haircut, since I don’t know the words for "fade," "longer," "shorter," "hair cut" or just about anything else. (I do know how to say "hair" but I couldn't find any reason to use it while I was in there). I quickly resorted to sign language, indicating that I would like it shorter on the sides and a bit longer on the top. He seemed to understand and reached to pick up the electric clippers.

Next I discovered another glaring difference between American barbershops and this one in Shanghai: the electric clippers are generally kept on a shelf, perhaps in a cabinet or some sort of a box in America; here the clippers were kept on the floor. Honestly though, I didn't care if the clippers are covered in a dozen random people's hair: I just wanted to get a normal looking haircut.

Unfortunately it wasn't to be. The guy seemed very professional. He did an excellent job on the sides of my head, displaying enough skill with the razor/comb combo that I decided I was in good hands. He switched to the scissors for the top when I asked him to (side note: I don’t think you really need to learn the word for scissors in other languages, because the two fingers cutting motion is probably the most universally recognized hand gesture). When he was done I thought, cool, it looks good and was very proud of myself for getting such a bargain on a haircut (12 kuai = $1.50).

However, leaving the shop I realized the last difference between the Shanghai barbershop and the Paraguayan and Vietnamese ones I grew up with in Bethesda, Maryland--they don't have one of those mirrors to show you the back of your head. For years and years American barbers have been showing me the back of my head and not once did I have a problem. I often wondered why they bothered.

Running my hand through my hair as I walked down the block, I realized that my hair was twice as long in the back as in the front. I'm thinking that maybe my hair is very different from Chinese people's hair so he didn’t realize what a butchering he was giving. The only other Chinese barber I've ever used was Garrett, and he always did a great job. Then again, he's a banana so that doesn't really count.

The last two hours I've spent clipping my hair with a pair of dull scissors in the bathroom mirror. Unfortunately I still don't have a hand mirror to see the back, but the chrome lid to my trashcan provided enough reflection to kinda see what I was doing. Nonetheless, I'm confident there are several large bald spots on topof my head somewhere. The good news is, as I've noted in previous e-mails, I am more than 5 inches taller than almost everybody else here, so it is unlikely that anybody will be able to notice anyways.

(Garrett, when you come visit me in June, please bring your clippers. I am going to have to call in a favor)

Labels: china, my favorite posts