Big Hair-ing, Not Caring

30 Days in Istanbul: Day 23

Nothing here works the way I think it should. Nothing. I’ve been in this country 7 months and I still haven’t figured that out. More to the point, I still get worked up about it.

I had a hair appointment today. It was at a place that specializes curly hair. If you have or love someone who has curly hair, you understand the importance of this. The trauma of the terrible cuts. The trepidation of trying someone new. We’ve all come out of a salon looking like Christmas trees or balls of cotton candy (when this was not the desired look).

We research and hunt down the curly hairdressers. We compare notes with other curlies. And we take the plunge. (Side note: this is how my friend Sara and I fell in with the LGBTQIA2S+ diaspora population of Yerevan, Armenia, who became our posse for two months and showed us the absolute best time.)

As usual, I thought I was prepared. I was dressed on time. Django was all set to go to our friend-from-Saturday-night Mo’s for dog-sitting. I messaged Mo to confirm where his house was. Mo did not respond. I waited a polite amount of time and messaged him again. Nothing. I swore a bit. My heart sinking, I messaged the hair place and asked them if I could bring my "very small and well-behaved dog” to my appointment. They wrote back and said sure. I messaged three local friends to find out if I could bring Django on the metro, since we all know that taxis here are a moot point.

“Give it a shot,” Askin responded. “This is Turkey.”

I gave it a shot.

We were only 20 minutes late. This wasn’t helped by the fact that the salon somehow had a different name than from its own Instagram account. Also, when female curl-heads hunt down places where they specialize in curly hair, we expect the cutting to be done by women. Nope. Two men started fussing with my head, all of us using Google translate to try to explain highlight shades and texture issues. After a time, the main guy tapped something out on his phone and held up out for me to see.

“When you leave here,” it read, “your hair will be legendary.”

You have to laugh.

In the end, four men worked on my hair, all at the same time. They handed foils back and forth and painted and discussed. There was one colour and another colour and a toner and unexplained/untranslatable other stuff. It was painted on, removed, painted on again. They cooed over Django and brought me coffee.

At a certain point, I went from “this is so nice and charming” to “is this just a set up to eventually rip off the silly white lady with the small dog who doesn’t understand what’s going on?” That was 3 hours in. I thought about asking, but also, you do not want to get on the bad side of someone who is about to take scissors to your locks. Somewhere at the 4 hour mark, I gave up.

I mean, I gave up trying to control that situation. But also, I decided to give up trying to control anything in this country at all. Trying to be on time. Trying to count on people being on time. (Mo did call in a panic 20 minutes after we left, apologizing left and right that he’d slept in.) Trying to not get ripped off. Trying to plan anything in advance.

I’m supposed to fly back to Fethiye on Friday. There’s supposed to be a snowstorm here on Thursday night. Last time that happened they shut the airports. I don’t know where I’m going to stay. I chatted with a woman who had an AirBnb nearby, and then she, too, vanished. Everything else will involve either massive amounts of money or shlepping across the city, and we all know by now how easy schlepping is in this place. But it’s a constant reminder, literally every hour of the day, that nothing is in my control, ever. I just think it is. I tell myself it is. Turkey is the perfect teacher for me.

Getting my hair done usually takes two, maybe two and a half in Canada. Those boys worked on my hair for FIVE HOURS. Once the colour was done, we entered a session not unlike the famous hair cutting scene in Ted Lasso. There was extensive, and I mean extensive, “preparation.” There were flourishes. My main guy would walk around my head and examine it, lean in and do one snip, and then stand back again. Halfway through, they doused my head with some kind of potion and blowdried it all over again. It was too much. It was amazing And since the 90s are back, my friends, it was huge.

The photo that follows was at his request, not mine. The photo-taking session lasted another 20 minutes. All I could do was laugh. In the end, I paid a not-exorbitant-for-Canada-but-hefty-for-Turkey fee, 10% cheaper in cash, of course.

To my even greater amusement, as soon as I walked out the door (my peripheral vision blocked on either side) a taxi driver stopped in the street.

“You need a ride?” he called out, in Turkish.

“No, thank you,” I replied, also in Turkish.

And Django and I and my hair walked off into the night.