A Random Story

So yeah, I am having a catch up day - laundry, blog, whatever, and decided to add haircut into the mix. So I saw a place with scissors on the window and wandered in. Now, my vietnemese is non existent and did not bring my phrase book with me, and luckily, the people there did not speak english either. Clearly not a good start, but on the bright side, when someone asks me in English I never seem to have a good answer, so we just got to skip that awkward step and just made a scissoring motion with my fingers through my hair. To give you the mental image of my haircut that I had, imagine the Chef from the muppets, the guys hands were flailing around but it did not look like anything was happening. So every 5 or 6 swipes, a couple hairs seemed to get cut. And I wanted him to cut my hair shorter, so I tried another couple funny hand motions and and slowly spoken english - but clearly that did not work. So anyway, what seemed like an incredibly long time but probably wasnt, it seemed he had taken my mop and cut/combed it into perfect sphere - I am not kidding. But since I could not communicate what to change, i figured i would have to go elsewhere if i wanted it fixed. Whatever, maybe i was just being weird cause my hair hadnt been combed in several months.

Anyway, they offered to was my hair afterwards, and at first I tried to get out of it, but let it go. Which was the smart thing to do. Now - it seems that almost everyone in SE Asia seems to be able to offer massages, and instead of just a washing, I got a 45 minute wash and face, neck, head, and ear massage. I note ear separately cause that was the best part. It also think they put 3-4 different products in my hair during this process, but sort of lost track. The girl doing this part and I were having equal difficulty communicating as the guy cutting my hair, but we tried which was amusing. And at the end, all 3 of us were just laughing by the end of it when I paid. Funnier still, after all that extra stuff, when I sat back down, my hair seemed much less spherical and it was a good haircut. At $6.50, I am trying to decide if I overpaid...... haha

Alright, until next time......I am off into the mountains in the North of Vietnam for some hiking and a homestay with a family. I cross into China in about 5 days. Take care.