I returned to the hairdresser who gave me my last cut, once again an embarrassing length of time since the last one (though slightly less embarrassing than the last). I went there largely because I’d been putting off going to the GF’s good hairdresser for a few weeks as they take bookings on the phone or in person and I can’t face that, while this fellow takes them on Whatsapp. I arrived and he started cutting my hair verrry slowly and unsurely, and also put on perhaps the worst song in the world, Sting’s ‘Englishman in New York’.
At some point, though, another person arrived, a smaller, rangier fellow who looked and moved like a carnivore, a big cat or perhaps a jackal and later when he came closer there was something about him that even smelt like a carnivore. This, it turned out was the actual hairdresser – why he had not been present when I had made an appointment is beyond me – so when he took over, the difference was immediately noticable as he was quick, firm and assured and seemed to know exactly what to do. Over my head a conversation went on, as they clearly debated where I was from. Finally the hairdresser asked me, I said Pakistan and he told the others. One of them objected that my name (my actual name) could only be from a specific country which was not Pakistan and so the conversation continued, with the hairdresser informing his apprentices of all the countries that name might be from.
Anyway, I was moderately pleased with the cut, more pleased than I was the last time, but the GF and a friend were both lukewarm about it at best. Oh well. I must admit, I have no idea what sort of cut I should get or even what a good cut is, aside from obvious wonkiness.
Our afternoon mission was to go to the hospital to see if we could get our vaccine appointment sorted there, so off we went. It was starting to drizzle as we left and within a few minutes it was pouring. We took shelter in one of the passages along Istilkal street, and explored it a little – a very fine place, like a Harry Potteresque wizarding world, with windows of offices and perhaps flat looking down a narrow glass-roofed passage lined with tea shops and second hand clothes shops.
The rain became, if anything, stronger and fell in waves like in KL so it made me all nostalgic. The storm drains were overwhelmed and a vast pool grew along Istiklal Caddesi, like a moat in front of the Russian consulate. This reminded me not so much of KL as of Lahore.
When the rain slowed to a brisk drizzle we dashed out, but of course it soon started to rain again, and I was quite, quite soaked. The hospital itself is at the foot of a very steep hill, and there was a torrent running down it, so our feet and shoes were completely soaked. We arrived and were told they couldn’t help us. So we trudged back through the pouring rain, decided that we were too wet to go for a coffee and returned to the flat for a cup of tea instead.
I do have another thought on how to arrange this vaccination, though it will have to wait till after the weekend now.