100 % More Korean

I love this Before and After comparison although my self-portraits aren't doing it justice. In case you can't tell, my hair is soo Korean now.

The place was called "Hair Day" which is a not-quite-exact translation of "Muh-lee Ha-neun-Nal," which means "Day To Get My Hair Did". It quite literally was a "Hair Day" because this fancy, Korean "setting perm" TAKES ALL DAY. I actually spent...wait for it...4 hours in a salon chair. I began to feel like what I imagine prisoners might eventually acquiesce to, a feeling of, "This is my place. My new home."

It was just like being in Korea. The lady who shampooed my hair smelled faintly of garlic. I sat under a high-tech hair dryer that tinkles a lullabye as it orbits the head. They had crazy contraptions for waving and straightening. Nobody spoke English.

I had lots of time to stare (plus, salon mirrors help). Everyone in the salon had exceptional hair. All different styles, all amazing. I decided that I've been going about "hair" all wrong. A black lady wouldn't go to a white salon. Why do I? There's a pompous Queen St salon that fried my hair a few years ago, insisting that their way is the only way to perm. I feel like busting in there and shaking my head in their face. "I am KOREAN. If there's anything I know, IT'S PERMS." Then they'd take a moment to touch my hair ("Feel! So soft!") and then I'd spin on my heel and storm out. I can't stand that guy. He deserves to see what he is incapable of.

The entire experience was way long for me but my whole life these days has been feeling simultaneously slow and fast. Also, the ladies attending to me were so meticulous that I just loved watching them work. I looked at my whole head as an oddity, swathed in several types of rollers, a complicated ribbon of cotton padding and not only a shower cap but miniature shower caps for each ear! I thought, "I am going to be SO CUTE like a Monchichi when I get outta here." Y'all know my penchant for cute things and if you just wandered Koreatown for a second you might understand better. It is in my blood. Koreans LOVE cute.