Thursday, November 23, 2006

Barbershop Blues

Needing a haircut, we descended some stairs into a basement barbershop we'd stumbled upon while walking down some side-streets some distance from our apartment. The enthusiastic barber was not put off by the prospect of cutting non-Korean hair - in fact - I could be shaved as well if I liked. I kindly refused the offer and being told 'but a woman does it' did nothing to increase my enthusiasm - I'm not partial to sharp blades being held to my throat, whether the protagonist is male or female thank you very much.

Now, sat in the barber's chair, I saw a shape flash by in the murky background - my girlfriend told me afterwards it was a woman in her early twenties who does the shaving - and apparently as it turns out, the massages if they are requested - in a back room. She wore in a red dress which was more revealing than you might have thought necessary... fascinating.

It was a good haircut, but I think we'll try somewhere else next time.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

try hair salons, they offer quality service , fast , fashionable haircut. inexpensive also. every department store has at least one, and you will find lined up designer hair salons in every commercial street , down town street like seomyun, heawoondae, gwangan lee, nampodong etc.

Dave said...

I remember such services being pretty "common" when I was there (15 years ago). Picking the "right" barber was more difficult than this westerner would have expected. Thanks for the memories!

Mike said...

I go to a nearby hair salon these days, where the male stylist with his New-Romantic 1980s haircut gives me pithy looks every time I ask him to shave everything off.

I think the Government are trying to crackdown on the barbershop activities - but this being Korea nothing's actually happening at the local police level.

Matthew Awalt said...

That's awesome.....what's the address....

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