Close Shaves I Have Had

Lenin points to the future.

The badge of the crusty traveler is their hair: for men, facial; and for women, underarm.  When you’re away from home for an extended period of time, it’s nice to have a sense of belonging or place.  Joining the union of long-termers gives you scoffing rights at mere tourists, their cold beers and warm beds while you spend important hours comparing brands of instant ramen (wei-wei, your friend for life) in order to save two cents.  In the end, it’s the principle of the thing and it all goes towards lasting a day longer without a job. At the same time, one is always behooved when abroad, to recall that you are a goodwill ambassador from your country.  And, with that in mind, I’ve occasionally budgeted the extra fifteen cents to buy some time from the local barber.

Ah, the corner barber.  Captured by Norman Rockwell and known to all men of my father’s generation as a social gathering and refuge from women.  Sadly, in the West, this is a dying tradition.  But in the East it continues with bold assurance from the Himalayan peaks of Nepal to the bottoms of the concrete and glass canyons of Japan.  Sampling barber’s shaves has become almost as integral to my travels as sampling the local liquor; although I caution against mixing the two experiences lest the alcohol slow your tongue just before a crucial snip.

All you need is a barber’s chair and scissors…really just scissors

I started my fascination with barber’s shaves long before I had reason to own a razor myself; the hot facial towels looked so appealing, I suppose.  Later, the image of that “perfect shave” was enough to impel me to try the open air, street side cardboard mat of a Delhi blade runner.  Amongst the garbage-grazing cows, bare feet, punjabi suits, saris, washer women, vegetable hawkers, speeding tuk-tuks and beetle-nut spit, I sat while my new friend (believe me, you don’t want anyone with a knife at your throat to be your enemy) lathered my face from his dented, tin cup and changed the blade on his straight razor.  My heart pounded in anxiety.   The cattle lowed.  The tuk-tuks tukked.  The beetle-nut chewers spat.  And, to that third world symphony, the thin, brown man danced a smooth and gentle dance upon my face.  My first shave was a tarantella.

I’m always amazed, when I get a straight razor shave, that I can walk out not only alive but with most of my blood still in my veins.  If I shave myself, I always buy the super-saftey razors and still end up with tissue paper on my bloodied chin.  Never the less, when I’m in The Chair I can’t shake the image of Medieval, blood-letting barber-doctors or Sweeny Todd, the demon barber of Fleet Street.  Imagine then my trepidation at finding myself in the chair of a one-eyed barber near the roof of the world and far from any medical assistance.

Barber’s shaves are great.

I don’t want to overstate it but barber’s shaves are great.  I’ve dodged the heat in air conditioned shops in Malaysia.  I’ve hit seedy, backroom shops in Bangkok with barber’s chairs and moldy walls.  I’ve sat in a chair in a room with no walls in Indonesia and on a mat with no roof in Delhi.  I’ve been cut and beaten in back alley shops of Bombay, and I keep going back.  Even the fifteen dollars for a treatment in Japan isn’t a deterrent.  The shaves are just that good.  Good for the body, good for the soul, good for the economy and good for my reputation as American traveler cum ambassador.  Also, there’s nothing wrong with trying to impress the girls with a hairless forehead.