The Haircut

Stardate October 20, 2023

Job one is to get a haircut for the wedding.  I know a guy...  My barber is Wahid Khan and he is a master.  He is the manager at Shazia's Unikk Barber Shop in Lautoka.  He has cut my hair twice now and I swear these have been the best haircuts I have ever had.  Real old-fashioned, with straight razor trims and a splash of astringent cologne at the end.  He charges $15 FJD.  That's $7.50 USD.  Unbelievable.

So I want into Lautoka this morning with the intention of getting my hair cut.  Turns out I missed the bus at Vuda.  Don't know how - I was early.  I guess so was the bus.  There was a guy siting there who told me that the bus had gone.  About this time his ride showed up.  I asked him if he minded sharing the taxi into Lautoka.  He laughed and said it was his friend but he would ask.  The friend said sure and I hopped in the back seat.  About the half-way point, the friend suddenly remembered he had to go to Nadi - the opposite direction.  So they dropped me off at a bus stop on the King's Highway into Lautoka and I caught a bus five minutes later.

I got to Unikk Barber Shop and asked for Mr. Khan. The guys said he wasn't there but that he would be in about an hour.  They were very effusive and offered to get me his phone number.  I said I had his card and that I would just come back in an hour.  So I walked down the street and met Ian, who was in town too.  We had coffee at a very upscale coffee shop in the Tappoo City Mall.  After an hour, I walked back and sure enough, there was Mr. Khan waiting for me.

So I thanked him for having the time to cut my hair, yadda, yadda, yadda.  He seemed to be in a more somber mood than I had remembered from my past visits.  Turns out his 16 year old son was in the hospital battling a viral infection that was pretty serious.  Serious to the point where they were giving him morphine to ease the pain.  And that he (Mr. Khan) had had only an hour's sleep the night before.  And that he had been at his son's bedside this morning.  And that the guys I had talked to had called him to tell him that there was a customer here that would only trust Mr. Khan with his hair.  (I actually did say that.)

Holy was!  Now I felt like shit.  I took this man away from his son's hospital bed for a freaking HAIRCUT?  I wanted to find those two guys and ask them WHAT WERE YOU THINKING?  Why didn't they tell me that? - they could have cut my hair.  Anybody could have cut my hair.  I didn't need to pull Wahid Khan away from his sick son for a haircut!  

Of course I gave Mr. Khan twenty dollars for the haircut.  Then I asked him if I could help out his son.  He looked a bit puzzled until I pulled a fifty out of my wallet.  "I have a son too," I told him as he shook my hand.  "God bless you," he said.  I left with hopes expressed that I would see him again.  He returned the sentiment.

So how is the haircut?  Let's just say I look more like George Clooney than George Clooney.  Yeah.  It's that good.

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