Barber's shop

I remember a story from school in which a man visits a photographer and ends up in a lot of misery. In my case it has always been the barber who is on the wrong side of all my fashion statements. Exactly how often (or seldom) does a person need a haircut? This is a question that has probably been hanging around ever since the chicken-egg paradox was discovered. I would say the answer has more to do with fate than anything else. The day invariably comes when I look at the mirror and the feverishness arises-"Arvind, you just have way too much hair...it doesn't fit your persona!!" and this feeling never subsides until you have the cut(Patta pin unarum manamae)!!

Waiting at the shop is an experience in itself-more so in Hyderabad for there are no Tamil newspapers to browse through (not even English!) and I have to settle for picture-browsing in Telugu papers-and quite uncharacteristically these Telugu reporters seem to have little spice in their lives-for all I get is a gleaming YSR or an agitating Chandrababu Naidu or worse still, an old dilapidated photograph of an actress who just decided that life was too much and took a plunge from the top of the staircase!! Where are all the Shreyas and Genelias!! Dont these guys find them photogenic??!

Then comes the big moment, when you get your turn to sit on that Aasana. How much ever you adjust your head the guy never seems satisfied-"aur thoda aage jaana saab!" (go a little forward Sir) and when you are forward enough to see two images of yourself in the mirror and are not sure which one is getting the haircut, he starts. Now he throws the mythological question the answer to which has caused more misery to me than all the geography exams in school put together! "Short or Medium Saar?"-I find that a lot of people are very well equipped and prepared to answer this question-but yours truly almost never is! Medium means another visit to this wretched place real soon and short means...well we will see that later. This time I said-"Short" and definitely it was Lord Shani Himself seated there on tip of my toungue at that mythical moment when I said that...so short it was going to be...

Normal people usually have the option of stopping the destruction mid-way..on "seeing" what is being done to them they generally say-"Ok that should do." But for a sweet gullible boy like me with an eye-power of -6, well I have very few options other than to wait till the razor decides to stop and I scramble for my glasses to see what a work of art my head of hair has become at the moment. Now this is the point of no return, a sort of a emotional peak-when you want to scream at the top of your voice, but when the guy asks-"Ok hai Saar??" (Is it ok sir?) 'Oh sure it is ok to have a bulldozer run over my head when I am blind..thanks buddy' and I say-"Han ok hai, kitna?" With a proud smirk that might have put Bachanji to shame, he says-"Twenty Five rupees Saar." I pay and walk out, and he is not done yet..."Yehin phir aanaa saar..."(please come again)...Sure my friend-that will happen...but atleast, let me rest in peace until we meet again...