My experience at a Hair Parlour

Long hair has always been a sore problem of mine since ages. Hairfall and baldness are just recent twinges which got added to this long list of woes in my very small lifetime. And ever since I came to this new city, I had conservation about various things of life, let alone the quality of hair cutting these South Indian hair stylists intend to do. One of the few major factors which led to this oddly negative perception was this poster below, of a saloon, which I encountered in one of my evening walks.

'Mens' Hair Saloon

First things first, I never judge somebody by their English speaking or writing skill and also, English is just a language, not knowledge! But who am I to blame when Grammar Nazis like me are automatically attracted to such a vigorous audacity. Never mind the quality of Gibberish they put up in their poster, I collected enough courage to finally decide to cut my hideously long and weird hair.

Since the length of my hair was lengthier than what even Sonakshi Sinha sported in Akira, I had very limited options to keep my obnoxiously ghastly hair in the manner it was. So the next moment I could think of any other poor jokes, I found myself at the entrance of one of the many hair saloons in my locality.

For those of you who have constrained knowledge about hair saloons, let me inform you that there is a galaxy of differences between the types of Saloons which exist in Guwahati and the ones which are here in the city of Hyderabad.

So I was very much reluctant to let these hair-mongrels even an inch near to my hair but unlike competitive exams, I was left with no choice. No pun intended.

Since I am a Mechanical engineer, my hairstyle preferences are either short hair or long hair. There is no intermediate and attractive hairstyles in-between. So as soon as I entered the saloon, which resembled like a lavish leeway, I straightaway asked the barber to cut my hair short, as much as possible.

The barber was among the 99% of Hyderabadis, who had zero hold about the language of Hindi. But then, Hindi isn't even our National Language either. So I can't blame anyone here either. He reacted at my Hindi in a manner similar to how Indian book readers reacted to Chetan Bhagat's awelessly irritating dance moves in a TV reality show. Even 'Jadoo' from 'Koi Mil Gaya' understood Hindi better than that barber. I had to dolorously prompt him in some queer sign languages. It was starting to become a really excruciating time since the barber himself was a bald guy and I had to occasionally point at his head to indicate 'hair' during my conversation. My efforts were so natural, one of the customers gazed upon me with a bag-load of pity in his eyes. I felt like Tushar Kapoor minus the over-acting, from Golmaal.

Finally, after managing to explain my situation, I sat down in the over-customised chair, which was so comfortable I touched solace with my fag end. The moment he placed the trimmer and comb on my hair, I left the fate of my coiffure to a human whose only means of communication with me was through loony and defective hand signals. When he had finished cutting half the hair population from my head, I realized the biggest mistake of my life. There was no turning back! As I looked at myself in the front mirror, I wanted to laugh out as loud as possible and cry silently, both at the same time. He went on cutting my hair like a lawnmower mowing grass. My eyes were fixed on the mirror. I was too shocked to even react. I was turning from the Dhoni of pre-2007 to Dhoni right after winning the 2011 ICC World Cup. Sigh!

After he was finally done with his job, which got completed rather quickly, came the other shocking part. He said and I quote,

"₹120, sir"

At first I thought I misheard him but as the evening couldn't get any worse, I got a plain reality check. As I ran my hands through the pocket of my pants, which obviously had a sole ₹100 note, I was contemplating the consequences of a public outrage upon me as I didn't have the entire amount to pay the tonsorial artist. The Bahubali craze was still fresh on these people's mind for months now! And I wasn't even Milkha Singh to gallop away from these animated sons of Mahishmati.

I innocently explained to him how I had brought just a ₹100 note, showing off my emotional acting skills now. Maybe or maybe not due to my oscar-winning performance, he finally apprehended that since I was a student or maybe a 'naadan parindey', the price would be abridged to ₹100.

Even for present standards, that's a huge chunk of money for cutting off male whiskers. And reducing the price from ₹120 to ₹100, even Rahul Gandhi and the entire Congress clan's standards reduces much more significantly every year than that meagre amount. 

Like a wounded soldier, I returned back to my humble abode, head held high.

Jai Hind!