It was nothing like the movies. She didn’t lather my face with shaving cream, she didn’t wrap a big fluffy cotton towel around my neck, she didn’t even smile and speak in a comforting Italian accent. After a quick application of a rather thin cream she got to work with a brisk businesslike air. I could hear rather then feel the scrapping of the straight razor as she worked it around my face removing the two days of unwanted growth. A few minutes before I had watched my new friend Aaron go through the same process and for some unknown reason I had decided to try it myself.
I did learn one thing from the whole experience, what a bad shave can feel like, both during and after. There is now a standard in my head from which I can judge all future shaves…
The amount of blood that dripped from my neck was surprising and something I hadn’t experienced since I had first picked up a razor many years ago. The amount of stubble left was galling. When you get a shave you expect to walk away with your skin feeling as smooth as a babies butt, especially when you pay $150 (that’s in Taiwan dollars so figure about $5US). I walked away with a one day old beard (something that I remedied about ten minutes later with my own razor and no blood) and a valuable lesson learned.
The image I had of getting a shave, Matt Dillon and Edward Norton in the movie Rounders as they lay back in the old school barber shop being pampered like gangsters, was eternally shattered. Perhaps one day I will recover from the shock, but for now I need some time.
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Great Posts! You have got me hooked! Hope you have safe travels.
Andy
Hi Andy, Thanks for reading my blog!
Great! I lived in Kaohsiung for 6 years (1984-1990)
but I never had the shave experience!
I still have lots of memories about Kaohsiung …
Thanks for the posts!
Richard
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Kaishiung was a great city. I cannot even imagine what it was like then. The people living there described it as ‘the wild west.’ And be glad you didn’t get that shave…