Hei-ah Cutto (Japanese for 'Haircut')

The Japanese Haircut - far more than mere depillation.

Enter the shop, and, like a smart sushi restaurant, the barbers greet customers with a bright barrage of shouted politesse.

Placed in a chair, and the discussion begins. And soon stutters.

me: "Er, short please."
him: "[unintelligible reply]"
me: "Er. But not too short."
him: "[unintelligible reply]"

Resigned to my fate, I sit back and watch his every snip, eagle-eyed for signs of excessive enthusiasm.

But he keeps his zealotry in check, and even allows my sideys to remain. I ask for a shave as well, the cut-throat razor appealing to my bo-ho tendencies.

A hot towel wrapped around my jowls, I lie back in heated bliss, before my cheeks are lathered with the matronly firmness of a practised hand. Stubble is scraped from my jaw, my cheeks, my neck. As the barber negotiates my adam's apple, I politely ask Sweeney Todd to stop appearing in my mind.

And then he lifts the blade high, too high. Aghast, I realise his intent. He plans to shave my forehead.

My English sensibilities affronted, I shrink from the knife, and squirm out a 'No! No thank you!'

I assumed that such an eccentricity was a recent trend among the fashion-conscious Japanese males - surely people in the past weren't that silly.

Then I found this reference in the Japanese journals of Joseph Campbell, American writer famous for his work in the field of comparative mythology:

"I went for a haircut and since I could not direct my barber in Japanese had to submit to what happened. I found that when a Japanese has a shave the entire face, forehead and all, is shaved. I saved my forehead, but that was all." Tokyo, May 17th, 1955

It's strangely comforting to know that the Japanese male continues to prefer his brow bald, and occidental menfolk continue to fight to preserve that pasture unharvested.

Though one question remains; why do Japanese men want it shaved? Cultural difference, or racial variation. Could there be more fur on the oriental brow?

Thoughts please.

The haircut in question...

Before - the tousled sheep look:

After - shorn like a mewling lamb:


I mourn my lost locks.

Takachiho Gorge

Japan is a beautiful place, but its countryside is scarred with concrete. Flat land is built on, or farmed. Steep land is useless, so allowed to grow free. But even there, the cloud soaked hills bear the weight of large red and white pylons, rivers are strictly channelled, and bridges abound. There seems to be little concept of wilderness here, as all is tamed, directed, sanitised.

Bridges seem to come in threes, stacked above each other.

Fact: No river in Japan remains undammed.

The cause is well documented. The civil engineers make the decisions, not environmentalists. Politicians pump in money for public work schemes that reduce unemployment and shift benefits to the democratically-stronger countryside constituencies. Murkier dealings come to light from time to time; there is a lot of money to be made in construction, legally or not.

But there seems to be more going on in the underlying attitude to nature here. The Japanese have a strong sense that nature is out to get them, whether by Tsunami, Earthquake, Typhoon, Jellyfish [see entry for 10/21/06]. There is some truth in it, but the resulting paranoia is both restrictive and damaging.



I went to see the great gorge in Takachiho, central Kyushu; a wonderful place, with scuplted rock, corrugated cliffs, and cool green water.


The gorge is lined with concrete paths and fences. At least, it keeps the hordes of tourists in one place.



But the most beautiful part of the gorge has become a boating pond, for tourists to row around in. Or rather, for tourists to photograph each other rowing around in. While in fact going in circles. Is there a word to describe something that is at once comic and depressing?

As the gorge opens up at the end of the tourist trail, the path continues, but signs tell you not to carry on: “Dangerous! Stop!” Knowing by now the civil authority’s attitude to danger (ie paranoia), I carried on walking. As it turned out, by ‘danger’, it meant you would not have been able to get along it in a wheelchair. Probably not recommended for the infirm or very elderly. The path was wide and concrete, the river mellow, the single boulder easy to cross.





I should point out that these excessive warnings are not like those in the U.K. or America. Japan does not share our highly litigious culture. These signs are not the ‘Get out of Jail’ cards that our companies and organisations sprinkle so liberally to prevent damaging court cases. Rather, I think these are a sign of the very strong sense of public duty and culpability in Japanese society. If someone hurt themselves, that would be YOUR fault, as municipal worker.

As I walked, I grumbled to myself about all this paranoia and environmental damage. I clambered around on the rocks, and sat in the drizzle on a boulder, twisting around to try to find a direction that would allow me to avoid seeing any concrete. As I stepped from one stone to the next, it gave way beneath me, and I sprawled into the river, banging my knee and drenching my leg.



I limped back into town, tail between my legs. I think something heard me muttering about paranoia.

Spiders

I used to think I wasn't scared of spiders. Then I went for a walk in the woods.



I've been in Japan for nearly a month, and I hadn't been for a proper hike yet. So I got suited and booted and cycled up through Dazaifu to a shrine at the base of the very-small-mountains (well, hills). It took about an hour to get up there from my house, and on my skoda of a bicycle it was exhausting. Had a pleasant lunch in the grounds of the shrine, next to a friendly little old lady nattering to her friend in speedy nihongo [Japanese]. I decided to only attempt the smaller hill by the shrine, and save the much larger and steeper Houmon-san for another day. (Japanese mountains are given the same honorifics as people, eg Mount Fuji is Fuji-san, just as my name is Ollie-san. Or rather Oh-rrie-san.) Once I got into the woods and started up the hill I found the path was repeatedly broken by fallen trees and bamboo; Typhoon Shan-Shan clearly did more damage than I'd thought. I was in a bit of dopey mood from lack of sleep, and when I found there were three paths up the hill rather than the expected one, I was a bit flummoxed. Similar confusion followed my discovery of a signpost at a fork in the path, pointing in two different directions, neither of which I could read. Check mate Nihongo.

After a bit of an explore, I deemed the whole path thing to be overrated, and decided to go off-piste. With a map and compass, clear skies and well-spaced trees, what could possibly go wrong?

Suddenly I stopped. There was a cobweb inches from my chest, poised like a trip wire, ready to collapse onto me. My whole body flinched backwards, skin crawling. At the web's centre, an eight-legged, three-inch, black and yellow striped spider, balanced on its toe tips, curled like a claw. It was feeding on a large, tightly-bound moth. The web stretched between two trees about 2m apart, and the core of the web formed a disc 2ft in diameter. Baby spiders patrolled its edges, where the wind had scattered a few insects (now dessicated bundles).

I used a stick to clear the way in front of me, snapping the silk joists at arm's reach. With the first jolt the spider shot upwards with graceless mechanical speed, before freezing at the highest point, well above my head. With its strength broken, the web wafted free, hanging on the breeze. The thought of walking into it made my skin shriek. The stroke of those fine strands on my face, the realisation and hurried flutter of hands brushing away the clinging silk, carefully exploring the backs of my arms and body, dreading that I'd find needle legs on soft skin, unnatural scuttling across my lumbering limbs, sharp black and yellow on pale pink. With those thoughts in my mind and my stick held firmly above my head, I cowered under the web. I may even have whimpered, which can only have lowered the spider's opinion of me yet further. Then, well past the web, I stepped forward with relief.

Only to find another web, expectant, in front of me. I stopped to look around me. Two in every five or so trees had just such a web stretched between them. Every web with its dominant spider, content to wait and watch. As far as I could see, sheets hung in the trees, a creeping jewel nestled in each. Blowing full in the breeze, but remaining tightly bound as they stretched. The sheer number of them turned my stomach.

It took me a few minutes to get back onto the path, walking slowly as I peered ahead of me; checking for webs and clutching my stick, ready to fence. I wanted to head straight back down to the shrine, but decided to try one last path. After clambering over yet another fallen tree, I found myself facing an extended troop of 10 or so japanese hikers, descending in the opposite direction. My 'konichiwa' was met with an amiable but curt 'ah, english teacher'. (I don't think I've tried my Japanese on anyone yet who has not immediately replied in English, whether stilted or fluent.) They had kindly cleared the path ahead for me, so the remainder of my ascent was spider-free.

That said, I walked into my room that night and felt those slender strands across my face. I could see neither web nor spider; perhaps it was just my over-active imagination. But I keep looking in corners, and flinch whenever I see a spider. I wonder how long this will last...


ADDENDUM: Am not actually mad. Just found the spider in my room. Very small. Definitely not scary. Phew.