i stepped into the marvelous world of cutting-edge hair stylists and your better neighbourhood salons when i met the most gorgeous hair-cutting guy on the face of this earth at salon rococco. it was my birthday, and my best friend at the time, jaime, had given me this really hot gift certificate entitling me to all of these things i've never even dreamt of....scalp massages, cuts, foils, highlights...and get this - on THREE SEPARATE VISITS! my only other experience in hair was at the local hair masters in the local mall, which was located across from the public library and frequented by scrawny little kids and characters from the tavern across the street. anyway, the most golden, gorgeous man i had ever seen with my grade 11 eyes washed and cut my hair (i wrote an elaborate essay about this experience and won $1000 bucks for it a few years ago) and since then, i've never looked back. through trial and tribulation, i've bounced around from salon to salon, mostly along yorkville's tony little stretch, being unfaithful most of the time to any stylist (there is no such thing as monogamy in the world of hair and mousse!), going where the cut seemed and was deemed sharpest for that month, or season. today, however, i took it one step further, and i actually permed my hair. and i didn't do it in yorkville. almost on an impulse, i went to koreatown this morning and asked for the japanese straightening technique, magic straight. virtually all korean girls, between the ages of say, 12 and 26, probably have their hair magic straighted (just like how virtually all korean girls, between 12 and 26 - and beyond - have had eyelids surigcally cut out for themselves). i suppose, like the eyelids, its like a rite of passage. anyway, being a wholly western-raised korean, these trends reach me at least a year too late, and so i went for my first magic straight today.

firstly, i should tell you that my korean leaves much to be desired. korean grammar is difficult, and although i understand korean well enough, can write it somewhat and speak it haltingly, i generally come across as a big old dumbo (it kind of reminds me of the time that this korean radio station wanted to interview me because i won some kind of competition, and they were recording my answers, but we had to stop and start again because on the recording, we could hear my mother telling me what to say). i think most koreans somehow know, either from my gait, or my un-sugically-altered eyelids, or my general look of deer-in-front-of-headlights confusion, that i'm not expertly fluent, and usually greet me with "hello" instead of the korean equivalent. anyway, i'm not THAT terrible. i mean, i knew enough to joke around with the guy who was ironing my head (who, in a complimentary fashion, suggested i probably had 8 boyfriends, and kindly told me i was pretty, despite my haggard and sweaty appearance this morning).

anyway, i think this new straight flat, super straight hair is my ticket into a new club. other girls check out my hair now! korean girls, mostly. i think they can sense when other korean girls with super straight hair are near, and it's like we're all in a secret society now. korean boys that i know are probably recently immigrated or here as students (and probably very much younger than me) turn around (several times) to see just who has this super straight hair (and yes, i do fling it around for dramatic tension). i feel so much more korean; the korean-ness emanates from my gleaming locks, and now everything about me just screams korean! korean! it's so strange, the transformative power of hair. go figure.

anyway, i'll enjoy this moonlighting, for the summer, at least.