New Hairstyle
New Hairstyle.
I was very happy that day. For the first time in my entire life I decided to change my hair style. The reason was pretty obvious. I was balding in the front. But not much. (Keeping in mind the audience for this article may contain girls) I had read a humorous article on “My first white hair” when I was 10 years old. I also wanted to write something of that kind. Unfortunately I could not write on the same subject because I already had a lot of gray hair.
This peculiar hair style was carried over since I had hair for the first time. Needless to say that my earlier hair style was entirely my mother’s concept. She was a fan of Dev Anand. My mother has a younger brother, who is 6-7 years younger to her. My grandmother used to work at a distant place during their childhood. Therefore I share the same hair style as my maternal uncle (everybody fondly calls him Chanda Mama). It seems that he had lesser guts than me. He has not changed the hair style for his entire life! So, changing my hair style was going to have same consequences as failing in the exam. It was a mini revolt against my mother’s regime. I gathered the courage of Bhagat Singh (only revolutionary that came to my mind at that moment, courtesy Rajkumar Santoshi. Needless to say history books are now a history for me) and headed towards the saloon.
On the small walk towards the saloon, I was thinking of the consequence (aftermath, actually) of my new hair style. I did not tell anyone that I was going to change the hairstyle. In a conservative family like ours, boys are not supposed to change their hairstyle until they become completely bald. This is very similar to the fact that boys are not supposed to commit suicide until they die of natural death. Girls are allowed when they are about to get married. Here, I am talking of changing the hairstyle, not suicide. I knew mother was going to be furious at me. My younger sister was going to say “It has not made an inch of difference to your personality. You are not going to become John Abraham by doing such silly things”. My father was definitely going to say a blank “Ok”, without even having trouble of getting his head out of newspapers and having a look at me. The real question was what was going to be the reaction of my friends. I knew they were going to notice a change in my personality and would definitely give their opinion. I had a gut feeling that most of them were going to like it. And with these thoughts I entered the saloon.
The saloon is always crowded on Sunday morning. But I have always enjoyed the long wait at saloon. Reason is simple. I have lot of free time to pass and all the film magazines were at my disposal. I have observed that all saloons have film magazines to read and all doctors have India Today. I never dared to ask them why so. In fact asking them such a thing would be of great risk. Because everybody surrenders his head to a barber and surrenders his fate to the doctor. The consequence of asking such a silly question can prove dangerous. Both doctors and barbers charge for taking something “out” of you. So, I read about the Amisha – Kareena clash, Swades – Veer Zaara clash, Mahesh Bhatt – morality clash, the Myth about Mallika and Jackie Chan, another rumour of Aishwarya appearing (I hate the word acting to associate with her) in Hollywood movie, and all other news which are of no use to me. As Calvin says “Weekends don’t count unless you spend them doing something completely pointless.” Having these pious thoughts in my mind, I sat on the hot seat.
My hair line was shifted from the left of my forehead to centre. After changing the hair style, I again started thinking of the impact this would have on my friends. I was so excited about my new hair style that I began to think of witty replies which I would give when someone asks “hey Tushar, change in hair style?” I was into my own world by now and did not even bother to pay my hair stylist. And even he did not ask for it! I walked a few steps when I remembered that I did not pay him. I turned back. He was looking at me. Still he did not ask for money. The look on his face made me skeptical initially, then worried and finally sad. When I gave him the money, the look on his face was shouting “Why are you giving me money? I don’t deserve any money for such a clumsy work”.
I reached home, expecting some sarcastic comments from my sister and mom. Nothing. No reaction from my mom. She did not say anything about it! Even my sister gave a very disinterested look at me and carried on with drying her hair. Suddenly there was a feeling of emptiness in my mind. What the hell has happened to them? Or nothing has happened? My friend came to me that morning. He noticed a change in me (thankfully). But he did not utter any word. Now I had to get this thing out of his mouth. So I asked him “Where do you go to set your hair yaar? This guy charges me Rs. 50 “. Finally he asked me the question which I was waiting eagerly to be asked. “Change in hair style?” I had already thought of an answer to this question, so I replied without wasting any time “Yaar, mom is ill, therefore I myself had to comb the hair today. hahahaa”. This was supposed to be a joke, but unfortunately he was angry with me for being late and was in no mood to listen to any joke. We then went to our katta (a place where many of my friends meet on Sundays). I expected that someone will trigger this question and we will have a full fledged discussion about my new hairstyle. Nobody did. All due to an Arsenal win over ManU.
On Monday too, nobody in my project or my other friends asked me about the new hairstyle. This was a big anti-climax for me, especially when all of us spend the day in chatting. This was burning my head now. Less hair on my head did not help to cool off the anger. This went on for a week. I met hundreds of my colleagues during that week. Not a single person asked me about my new hairstyle.
Finally I decided that something must be done in order to make others aware of my new hairstyle. I tried in many ways. But no success. Finally I sat on my PC, and started typing. I started with the title “New Hairstyle”.
I was very happy that day. For the first time in my entire life I decided to change my hair style. The reason was pretty obvious. I was balding in the front. But not much. (Keeping in mind the audience for this article may contain girls) I had read a humorous article on “My first white hair” when I was 10 years old. I also wanted to write something of that kind. Unfortunately I could not write on the same subject because I already had a lot of gray hair.
This peculiar hair style was carried over since I had hair for the first time. Needless to say that my earlier hair style was entirely my mother’s concept. She was a fan of Dev Anand. My mother has a younger brother, who is 6-7 years younger to her. My grandmother used to work at a distant place during their childhood. Therefore I share the same hair style as my maternal uncle (everybody fondly calls him Chanda Mama). It seems that he had lesser guts than me. He has not changed the hair style for his entire life! So, changing my hair style was going to have same consequences as failing in the exam. It was a mini revolt against my mother’s regime. I gathered the courage of Bhagat Singh (only revolutionary that came to my mind at that moment, courtesy Rajkumar Santoshi. Needless to say history books are now a history for me) and headed towards the saloon.
On the small walk towards the saloon, I was thinking of the consequence (aftermath, actually) of my new hair style. I did not tell anyone that I was going to change the hairstyle. In a conservative family like ours, boys are not supposed to change their hairstyle until they become completely bald. This is very similar to the fact that boys are not supposed to commit suicide until they die of natural death. Girls are allowed when they are about to get married. Here, I am talking of changing the hairstyle, not suicide. I knew mother was going to be furious at me. My younger sister was going to say “It has not made an inch of difference to your personality. You are not going to become John Abraham by doing such silly things”. My father was definitely going to say a blank “Ok”, without even having trouble of getting his head out of newspapers and having a look at me. The real question was what was going to be the reaction of my friends. I knew they were going to notice a change in my personality and would definitely give their opinion. I had a gut feeling that most of them were going to like it. And with these thoughts I entered the saloon.
The saloon is always crowded on Sunday morning. But I have always enjoyed the long wait at saloon. Reason is simple. I have lot of free time to pass and all the film magazines were at my disposal. I have observed that all saloons have film magazines to read and all doctors have India Today. I never dared to ask them why so. In fact asking them such a thing would be of great risk. Because everybody surrenders his head to a barber and surrenders his fate to the doctor. The consequence of asking such a silly question can prove dangerous. Both doctors and barbers charge for taking something “out” of you. So, I read about the Amisha – Kareena clash, Swades – Veer Zaara clash, Mahesh Bhatt – morality clash, the Myth about Mallika and Jackie Chan, another rumour of Aishwarya appearing (I hate the word acting to associate with her) in Hollywood movie, and all other news which are of no use to me. As Calvin says “Weekends don’t count unless you spend them doing something completely pointless.” Having these pious thoughts in my mind, I sat on the hot seat.
My hair line was shifted from the left of my forehead to centre. After changing the hair style, I again started thinking of the impact this would have on my friends. I was so excited about my new hair style that I began to think of witty replies which I would give when someone asks “hey Tushar, change in hair style?” I was into my own world by now and did not even bother to pay my hair stylist. And even he did not ask for it! I walked a few steps when I remembered that I did not pay him. I turned back. He was looking at me. Still he did not ask for money. The look on his face made me skeptical initially, then worried and finally sad. When I gave him the money, the look on his face was shouting “Why are you giving me money? I don’t deserve any money for such a clumsy work”.
I reached home, expecting some sarcastic comments from my sister and mom. Nothing. No reaction from my mom. She did not say anything about it! Even my sister gave a very disinterested look at me and carried on with drying her hair. Suddenly there was a feeling of emptiness in my mind. What the hell has happened to them? Or nothing has happened? My friend came to me that morning. He noticed a change in me (thankfully). But he did not utter any word. Now I had to get this thing out of his mouth. So I asked him “Where do you go to set your hair yaar? This guy charges me Rs. 50 “. Finally he asked me the question which I was waiting eagerly to be asked. “Change in hair style?” I had already thought of an answer to this question, so I replied without wasting any time “Yaar, mom is ill, therefore I myself had to comb the hair today. hahahaa”. This was supposed to be a joke, but unfortunately he was angry with me for being late and was in no mood to listen to any joke. We then went to our katta (a place where many of my friends meet on Sundays). I expected that someone will trigger this question and we will have a full fledged discussion about my new hairstyle. Nobody did. All due to an Arsenal win over ManU.
On Monday too, nobody in my project or my other friends asked me about the new hairstyle. This was a big anti-climax for me, especially when all of us spend the day in chatting. This was burning my head now. Less hair on my head did not help to cool off the anger. This went on for a week. I met hundreds of my colleagues during that week. Not a single person asked me about my new hairstyle.
Finally I decided that something must be done in order to make others aware of my new hairstyle. I tried in many ways. But no success. Finally I sat on my PC, and started typing. I started with the title “New Hairstyle”.
posted by Tushar Kulkarni | 11:21 PM
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