It is the first and I hope, last time I title my blog with a Bernard Manning joke, and fortunately for you the answer is not: leave her! I did have the misfortune however, to be in the position where I had to come up with an answer to the title question last week.
As usual,it wasn't just a simple case of walking down the street and passing under a tree full of incontinent pigeons. That would be too normal for this City, it was in fact while having my weekly shave.
I probably have to explain at this point that my weekly shave is not so much a matter of indulgence, more endurance. I stroll up to the market where there are 7 chairs spread out along the pavement, underneath a tarpaulin. It is here I find my arch nemesis and torturer in chief,Asif. He looks forward to my weekly trip to him in equal measure to the amount I dread it.The reason for this is that he charges me 5times what he charges the locals and I just can't say NO!
It doesn't matter how hard I try, or how much I repeat the word over and over in my head,I can't get those two little letters out. I am convinced he could ask me for my first born and I would just hand him over.I sit down in the chair and spell it out to him with words and mime, that I just want a shave. This is acknowledged and the shave commences. All relatively straight forward you would think? Oh no, this is where the problems start! See Asif has twigged that I find it hard to get out of the chair, hand over my 10rps and walk away and so preys on it.
Out comes the face cream and before I have had the chance to object my face is set in half an inch of a concrete like substance, that he makes himself - how he magics that up I dare not think!-. While this is drying on my face he goes to work on the head massage, nice you may be thinking but he has hands like anvils and by the time he has finished I am usually semi conscious. This allows him to go in for the kill with the neck, arm and hand massage, that culminates with a series of bone clicking tugs to my fingers that usually bring me out of my coma, just in time to enjoy the pain of the concrete being peeled off.
To add insult to injury, he charges me 100rps - about 1.50 - and laughs as I leave. You may ask why I go,and believe me I have asked myself but am struggling for answers. I have always found shaving a bit of a ball ache and the thought of someone else doing it for me seemed like such a luxury and it would be, if I could just say no! I digress though and have to now tell you how I managed to end up with bird crap on my head.
I took my seat randomly in the line of 7 and tilted my head back ready for my assault. As I looked up I noticed that I was sitting in a gap in the tarpaulin,staring into the trees and blue sky above (as seen in picture above). I joked to Asif that I would be in trouble if it rained, he grinned manically and yanked my chin down ricking my neck!
It was while sitting there, head back with the butcher of Boha Rao market poised with cut throat razor over my Adam's apple, that I looked up and noticed a bird fighting a squirrel. I watched with amazement and realised this wasn't an every day experience, when IT happened.
The bird, clearly terrified let rip with its weapon of crap production and from it's trajectory, I could tell it was heading my way. I had a sudden flashback to my youth when my sister - a girl that could have taught the soldiers at Abu Ghraib a thing or two - would pin me down with her knees holding my arms, while dripping spit from her mouth over my face! This would happen only after she had eaten an orange, so as to get extra elasticity from her saliva torture weapon. With this in mind, I had a decision to make. Thrash around wildly throwing head from side to side - as I did with my sister - and risk having The Butcher slash out my adams apple, or sit still, keep my life and take it on the chin so to speak.
With resigned indignation, I sat and accepted my fate and let the pigeons projectile explode on my forehead. The watching crowd erupted in laughter while I sat still frozen to the chair, as Asif wiped it off and carried on as if nothing happened! He finished the shave, wiped my face with the same towel he used to wipe up the crap and carried on with beating me up while I failed to say "no more" as usual.
I know now that I have the perfect reason not to go back for my weekly torture but know - as does Asif - that I will be back for more. It has become a sort of character test for me now. I feel that until I can say no to Asif, I can't move on and find a new barber. I need closure now not only from my inability to say no but also thanks to the pigeon, the horror of my youthful torture at the hands of my sister. Hard to believe that a simple trip to the barbers is going to end up with me in therapy!!
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