Topic: news Learning to Trust Your Chinese Barber

As a fellow holder of long hair, I can completely understand your apprehension about going to a stylist. My parents were terrified for me as I was growing up, so trips to the salon were out of the question - my mom insisted on cutting my hair for the vast majority of my young life. When I finally ventured out for something less sixties, I went to a beauty school because I was in college and a real salon was far beyond my meager budget. While they did an amazing job fixing my not one but THREE terrible attempts at going blonde, the girl made a mistake while giving me my first-ever layers and ended up having to have the instructor fix it, while I sat there crying as I saw foot-long pieces of my hair hitting the floor. It's now five years later and my hair still isn't as long as it once was.

In China, however, I grabbed hold of my fears and finally had a professional do my hair again, getting my hair both cut and dyed at the salon. Not only did he give me a color that was close to but even better than what I had pictured on myself, but the cut was the best I've ever received. At first he was polite and did exactly what I asked (basic trim), but then I became bold and asked him in choppy Chinese if there was any particular look he thought would work well on me. After studying me for a few moments, he ran off, grabbed a magazine, and flipped through it, searching for a specific page. He laid it in my lap, pointed, and I agreed to go through with it, my heart pounding.

It turned out amazing - to the point that, after being back in the states for a year, I visited the same salon within weeks of returning to China to ask for him specifically. Alas, he had moved on, but I have yet to suffer bad-cut blues in this country. Additionally, Chinese barbers seem more respectful of the idea that I want to keep growing my hair out, and will truly cut off the bare minimum. My experience at American salons was always one where I would tell them how much to take off, they'd say they understood, and then proceed to chop off one to three inches more than I'd wanted. And that I was with people I was capable of spoken communication with, not having to mime each step of the process supplemented with a few key phrases.

And Andrea is right - it does feel like Chinese barbers have mastered some sort of mind-meld while working on hair.