Hairdressers in Berlin

Snip snip snip…
I am one of those apparently VERY rare specimens of people who don’t enjoy getting my hair cut. At all. I have to put my neck in a weird position while someone I’ve never met touches my head and scrubs my hair. It’s weird. In Japan they give you a towel to put over your head, but here in Berlin and in London I never know what to do with my eyes. Stare at the ceiling? Close my eyes and imagine I’m getting a head massage? It just doesn’t work for me.
I don’t want to hear about my hairdressers problems in life. I don’t want to ask how long they’ve been cutting hair, if they enjoy it, if they cut their own hair. I don’t care. I’m all for small talk etc, but just not at the hair dressers. I want to tell the person exactly what I want and then have them do exactly that, super quickly, and then I just want to leave. I always feel out of place and it’s so awkward. That’s probably why I only go once or twice a year.
However, in my 32 years of experience, I’ve NEVER had a perfect experience at the hair dressers. They seem to think that it’s fine for them to have some fun with my hair and cut it as they wish. And then I get to pay for the ‘honour’. It drives me crazy. I have told them what I want and they can see I have curly hair. Even when I bring I photo with me of what I want I come out looking different. I’ve been to hairdressers four times here in Berlin. The first time was just before my 30th birthday. I wanted to be blond. It was a big birthday and I was quitting my job and I just wanted to do something crazy. I walked out with a few blond-ish highlights (I was told blond would definitely not suit me) and my parting on the wrong side of my face (apparently it suited me better there). ARGH! I paid an extortionate amount for this at L’Atelier. I will admit my hair was beautiful and the colour really suited me, but every time I looked in the mirror I looked ‘wrong’ and by day two I had put my parting back to where I liked it.
I tried L’Atelier again, once more wanting to be blond. I left with my hair a little lighter than before, but it was still just highlighted and most of my hair was brown. I didn’t get it cut again as I just wasn’t impressed.
Instead, I got it cut at Hair Sweet Hair – which was literally opposite our old apartment. I had my hair cut within ten minutes whilst standing (!!) and I loved it. It was fast, stylish and no talking happened. This is the only place I would recommend, as Jason went a few times and looked fab too. Since we moved, it’s far away from our home and the staff seem to change daily, so I looked for something closer to our new home.
I tried SK Styling. Jason often goes here (once he came back with side burns that were shorter than short, but otherwise he’s pretty happy with them). I asked for 2-3cms cut and same style as it already was. Before I knew it, the scissors had begun snipping away and I got 15cms cut in a straight line. I didn’t even know what to say. A straight line???? I have curly hair and that doesn’t work for my kind of hair at all. OMG WHAT? No one gets that kind of haircut after they’ve turned thirteen ‘coz it’s just not cool! I went home in shock and cut myself some layers at the front. Then I started to wonder why-oh-why we spend so much on hairdressers. These people seem to think they don’t need to listen to their customers’ wishes at all. So I’ve officially given up. No more power to these people!!
I went online and began researching how to cut my own hair. And do you know what? After spending seven euros for some hairdressing scissors and washing my hair it took literally thirty seconds to make one quick snip. Just one little cut gave me layers and nice looking hair. Three different people told me my hair looked lovely. People – let’s take the power of hairdressers back into our own hands and cut our own hair! As long as I have long hair I never plan on getting someone to cut my hair for me again. I’m delighted with the results I got and there were no awkward conversations or boring magazines I had to read. And it took less than a minute of my time – seriously, you people need to try this!