Barbershops

Readership, since my hair grows like a vociferous weed on plant-steroids, I've had to have several haircuts while I've been away at college in Queens. I had two last school year, and today, my second of this school year. There were three barbershops around St. John's. There were the Jewish guys, the black guys, and the Dominican guys. The black guys, much to my dismay, closed down at some point last year, second semester. I went to each barbershop once each, with the exception of the Dominican barbershop because of the aforementioned closing.

Anyway.

Each place was an experience, and since classes start tomorrow and I'm trying to be a good boy and get good grades - and thus won't have much free time to blog/bitch during the first week of classes - I thought I'd drop those experiences on ya. Let's do this (LEEEEROYYYYY JENKINSSSS).

The first place I ever went to get my hair cut was the black barbershop. Now, this was my first time ever setting foot inside a black barbershop, but I HAD seen the Ice Cube movie "Barbershop," so I had an idea of what to expect. I opened the door, stepped in, and instantly realized that the movie "Barbershop" was almost a carbon copy of the actual barbershop (minus Cedric the Entertainer) - right down to the one "Eminem" white guy in there cutting hair.

Suddenly, from around my left elbow, came a low, surly voice.

"Yo. You wanna get CUT?"

And I was like "WHOA WHAT THE FUCK NO!" and I sorta freaked out a bit. But he gave me a look that said, quite plainly, "dumbass cracka" and said "Nah b, your HAIR." And I was like "oh fo sho."

About an HOUR AND A HALF LATER, I'm still in the chair. I'm legally blind (duh) so I can't see my reflection too clearly, but from what I can see, he's just about done (cuz I'm lookin' good). Suddenly, he stops with the clipper, spins me around SUPER FAST to face him, and says, "yo . . . you want me to go get muh blade?"

"WHOA WHAT THE FUCK NO!" He shot me the same "dumbass cracka" look, went out to his car, and came back with a butterfly-knife (which worried me even more). He grabbed a spray bottle full of (what I thought was) water, and told me, and I quote, "put your head back." Something told me "CLOSE YO EYES BITCH" and I did, just in time - because it wasn't water.

It was rubbing alcohol.

The Jewish guys were, again, an experience. There were like six of them, but only two of them were cutting hair. The other four were watching the door, like they expected half of Palestine to suddenly flood through the door and try and take over. The two cutting hair were polar opposites. One was old and wise, the other young and trendy. The young guy cut my hair, and kept asking me questions about how I wanted my hair cut, like I was a retard. "Do you want it . . . like mine? Or . . . like his?" And I was sitting there like "are you fuckin' serious bro?"

As an aside, they were the only barbershop I visited with a cash register.

Lastly, and most recently, was the Dominican barbershop. I've been twice, and both times I was highly satisfied with the results. When I went the first time, I got the chill, older guy (out of the three barbers there; the other two were a little older than me and crazy).

I'm gonna pause here for a second to drop a little knowledge. I'm Puerto Rican. Obviously, Dominicans and Puerto Ricans both speak Spanish. Most people will tell you that Puerto Ricans speak quickly, regardless of what language they're speaking, and they'd be right. However, when it comes to speaking Spanish at a rapid pace, there is no race better than the Dominicans.

So, I'm sitting there in the chair, and these guys are rapid-firing Spanish at each other, and from the little bit that I actually catch, I come to understand that they're debating amongst themselves. The topic? My ethnicity. Finally, the chill guy cutting my hair stops and says to me, "What are you man?" So I told him. He smiled and laughed, because he won the argument.

The first thing the crazy younger guy says when I sit in the chair? He starts arguing with the chill guy about my ethnicity again. The chill guy goes "boriquen" which is Spanish slang for "Puerto Rican," and the crazy guy goes "No. Wrong. What are you buddy?" He was pissed when I told him I was Puerto Rican.

So yeah. Three different barbershops. Three very different flavors.

Completely unrelated to the above: I don't wanna go to class tomorrow.

Stay classy