I hope you haven’t paid too close attention to my hair. I mean, when I show myself in my travel photos it is usually in front of amazing landscapes, silly areas or just as a prop to compare the unimportance of man in contrast to nature (C.D. Friedrich, anyone?). My hair is certainly of no importance whatsoever. Regardless, it seems a big deal still as people in Japan keep staring at me whether I wear it blonde, with a pink or black wig. Come on! Maybe I should put less flowers in it?! And now I have done this!
“Looks can be deceiving, better guess again.” – Christina Milian, When you look at me
I Am My Hair
Seeing my hair change so much throughout my trip, has made me realise one thing. Not only is that very metaphorical of the change that travel causes in everyone, including me, of shedding external projections and expectations and just testing out limits as well, but it is basically a measurement of my blogging. Remember when your mom placed you in the door frame and measured your height and you looked back at all the lines and saw how fast you grew? That’s me with my hair. Except, it measures my blogging. Sounds strange? Bear with me.
When I launched my blog, I had found a groupon voucher for a hair dresser online and made the spontaneous decision of getting a pixie cut with pale pink hair. I always admired both trends and thought why not combine the two (should have followed Nicole Ritchie more, cause she knew what was up). It turned out the whole procedure was a disaster, the hair dressers quite at a loss of how to do it (it would have been nice to tell me upfront) and I ended up looking like P!nk in her early days. That’s where the flowers came in and I turned from a fiery amazon to a pixie. And apparently made it look as if it was on purpose. Score!
“I swear I’m as free as my hair.” – Lady Gaga, Hair
Pixie Gone Pink
Coincidentally, Fashion Week was just around the corner and the look was actually perfectly timed. And it didn’t take long until the hot pink was washed out to a soft one and I got bored being in the outback with pink hair and changed it to purple in the middle of my trip. Both looks got some serious attention in Australia with old ladies walking up to me, showering me with compliments and twenty-somethings asking for how I did it so they could copy (say what?!). I was surprised. Big time. But because it’s you, here’s my little secret. If you sweat a lot in hot Australia and go diving in salt water, then your colour washes out pretty quickly, leaving you with coloured roots and blonde ends – a look that is apparently very sought after.
I couldn’t be bothered with it anymore, though, and let it get washed away, leaving me completely blonde. Completely except my grown out roots. The Australian sun makes hair grow insanely fast! So I tried dyeing it myself but should have known that dyeing and bleaching wasn’t really the same thing. It still looked as if it was on purpose and together with my beloved flower band, nothing would have suggested otherwise. By the end of my trip, I wanted to get it down all the way to white, but stories of hair breaking off and never growing again had me rethink this and I invested in a wig instead. Saves you from bad hair days, too!
“Dye your hair suicide blonde” – The Weepies, Suicide Blonde
Back to the Roots
From scouring affordable hair stylists in Seoul with my Korean friends on the phone to translate and ultimately abandoning my suicide blonde mission over to checking out cosplay shops for the best wigs in rainbow colours and to ending up on an African stylists stool surrounded by long fake tresses and two women working off their serious braiding skills, I have put my hair through quite a lot. However, my my latest twist it can finally get some rest, grow in peace and look as awesome as I had imagined. Until I have to cut it and separate the strands, looking at how I can reinvent myself yet again.
And this is exactly the point of all this hair rambling, my roots are still there where they started out growing after my first major hair change. In plain sight and reminding me of how long I have been on the road, of how long I have been sharing my adventures with all of you and of how far I’ve come. And how long my hair hasn’t seen a hair dresser. So I do not only want to thank my hair for not falling out and putting up with my shenanigans, but mostly to thank you, lovely readers and followers for being there with me along the way. And being witnesses to my many changes with the biggest yet to come.
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