I am a girl.

As basic as this information might sound, it probably explains why a (foremost female) person might dedicate a blog entry to something as mundane and profane as a haircut. Girls, you know what I mean and guys – yes, this will reassure you with everything you’ve always thought about us crazy “WOMEN!”

Now, if a woman goes to a hair salon, she does so for one of two reasons:
1. She wants to change her style or
2. She just needs a trim. But: she always wants to feel good afterwards!

So when she gets out of the hair salon there are again two possibilities:
1. She feels great about her haircut or
2. She starts crying

Getting a haircut in Chile therefore was a real test of courage for me. I prepared myself extremely well: I studied Spanish hair-vocabulary at night and asked for the best places to get a hair cut in Santiago at day.

So there I was, shaking in a seat in Cesar’s salon explaining that I just wanted to cut off a little bit of my hair and fringe to make my haircut look like a haircut again. “Ah – si-po, claro!” How great – Cesar understood exactly what I wanted! Then he mumbled something about “movimiento” – he wanted my hair to move, I assumed. Well, okay, that couldn’t be so bad. It did scare me a little bit though that he constantly danced to the Tango music in the background WHILE cutting my hair. Scissors cutting to the beat, going tak-tak-tak-tak.

“Listo!”, he exclaims after his hair dance and all I can think is: “WHERE DID MY HAIR GO???” It’s SHORT!!!! So, polite as I am I ask Cesar:”What, for heaven’s sake did you think cutting my hair this short when I told you EXACTLY what to do???????” Cesar sighs, looks at me as if I were a student who didn’t understand the instructions of the teacher and says: “But chica – I just didn’t like your haircut!”

Lesson learned: Getting out of a CHILEAN hair salon a woman has two choices:
1. She kills her hairdresser or
2. She laughs

Cesar is still dancing...