I came to London to start a new life. But it didn’t take me long to realise that things worked differently in this new world. I had to look to the right before crossing the streets, to gulp porridge for breakfast, to try – and fail – to put my plug into their socket… These were some of the many unsettling experiences I was confronted with, from the very beginning. They were small oddities, harmless challenges; nevertheless, they kept on reminding me that I wasn’t from here. I felt like a misfit. If I wanted to merge into my new environment, I needed to adapt. Committed to becoming a new me, I decided to change my looks and go to the local hairdresser.
Whether it’s managed by bleached blond bimbos, Afro-Caribbean bodybuilders or cut-throat barbers, the ritual at the hairdresser’s is the same everywhere: you’re flipping through a magazine, hardly looking at it, when they come to fetch you. They lead you to a chair, they sit you down and they tie you up in a large apron so that you can neither move nor leave. All you can do is watch your worried face in the mirror in front of you. Once at their mercy, they ask, “How would you like it?” So, you give your instructions in the same way you’d dictate your last will, knowing that whatever you say, the destiny of your head is entirely in their hands.
Both the outcome of the haircut and the hairdressing experience depend on the hairdresser. Hence the importance of choosing them carefully. For my part, I prefer the bleached, blond bimbo type, provided they massage my head without crushing it with gossip. Unfortunately, when I looked for one in my neighbourhood, I couldn’t find any. Or they were overpriced. So, I had to fall back on the cheaper, cut-throat Turkish barber.
When I noticed that the man was bald, my puzzled face made him laugh. While leading me to a chair, sitting me down and tying me up, he told me that he was a fan of those Chinese kung fu movies from the seventies. He loved watching the monks fight the villains, jump high in the air to kick them in the face, smash them down, and dislocate their limbs before cracking their heads open with their bare hands. The benefit of working in a barber shop, explained my barber, was that he could have his head shaved as often as he liked, to keep it as glossy as the monks’. My eyes were riveted on his muscled arms, and a shiver ran down my spine when he placed himself right behind my chair. It was going to be a close shave.
Without warning, the barber’s firm hand grabbed my head, twisted my neck, and made it turn, while his other hand started to peel my skull with his clippers. I looked into the mirror and saw chunks of my hair falling into the large apron where I was sandwiched, red like a tomato. I hardly had time to breathe before the barber set fire to a cotton ball on a stick, and braised the tips of my ears. I don’t know whether any smoke came out of them because he quickly plunged my head into the sink. He smothered it with foam, kneaded it for a while, and stewed it under a towel before serving it to me, nicely warm.
When I looked again in the mirror, it showed me the reflection of a complete stranger. Would this guy be able to cross the streets of London without fear, enjoy his porridge every morning, and put his plug into a British socket? I wasn’t sure. However, I had no other choice than trying him out to be me. Eventually, the barber freed me from my chair. It might be because of my puzzled face, or simply a common practice at the local Middle Eastern barber’s, but on a small tray that lay beside the till, a Turkish delight was waiting to comfort me.
A story from the collection > Short & Sweet Delusions <
Rx Bodo 