My Chemical Hair

Since I will be attending a wedding this weekend plus my trip to London/Paris is next week, I thought I’d splurge just a bit on doing my hair. Sometime early this year, Jan had done this thing called “relaxing” her hair, which is similar to rebonding, except that the straightening looks more natural rather than the flat effect rebonding gives.

The last time I ever had any chemical work on my hair was 20 years ago. That produced such a major disaster that it put me completely off any chemical so my hair has been virgin since. Still, Jan’s hair looked pretty good so I was willing to give it a go.

Since there is a hairdresser near my office who always promotes their low prices, I thought I’d give it a try. I mean, it should be the same everywhere, right? So I made my appointment and went on Monday right after work.

Disaster Clue #1:
They didn’t have a separate pricing for relaxing but only for rebonding. The guy assured me he would do relaxing but since it’s “about the same as rebonding”, hence the pricing would be the same.

Disaster Clue #2:
The guy assigned to me could not speak English. He conversed in Cantonese while I gave my instructions in English. As you can imagine, more than half the things he said I could not understand and I’m sure he couldn’t understand what I wanted either. Like a duck talking to a chicken.

Disaster Clue #3:
Halfway through, I asked what was the difference between the process of relaxing and rebonding and he answered, “they are the same”.

Disaster Clue #4:
My hair is now slightly past my shoulders and is now curling out. I didn’t want it to curl out so I indicated to him several times that I wanted it cut shorter. His answer? “No!” and he went off in a lengthy explanation in Cantonese (I think) on why it would curl out because it touched my shoulder. That I know but I don’t WANT it to curl out!

When I freaked out when he said he was going to use an iron, he KNEW he had a green horn in his hands. “Your first time? You never do any chemical on your hair?” loud enough for the entire place to hear him. My confidence simply crumbled to the floor and was swept away amongst the cut hair. I began to compare between visiting a dentist or doing my hair (since both give me stress and worry) and at that point, visiting a dentist won.

By the time he was done, I could only stagger out of the shop four and the half hours later (past 10pm, Dad wasn’t too happy with me being out in such a dangerous area so late), bewildered as to what had just happened.

So yeah, my hair is flat as a pancake and it curls out. Exactly what I didn’t want! Sigh. My colleagues have been kind and haven’t even mentioned the difference. Here’s my artist impression on how it looks like:

Next time, I will only visit a hairdresser who speaks English, which can be quite a challenge here in the Klang Valley. Now I have to wait for 3 days before I can wash it (good luck to those around me!). There’s still a lingering waft of ammonia about my person. I can only hope that it would have some form of bounce when I wash it.