Haircut In Lam Tin

There’s a reason we drove all the way to this ulu-fied neighborhood shopping center for Rockstar’s first ever proper haircut (because we usually either shave him totally or let it all grow out and attempt to “style” it with baby moisturiser – which, btw, I also use sparingly to tame my own flyaways because I’m too lazy to buy a Whole Separate Hair Product.)

Hairstylist: So… There’s not much I need to do right, just tidy up?

Me: Really? You don’t need to take much off?

Hairstylist: Nope… That’s a girl, right?

Me: No, he’s not. I wanted him to have this haircut (show a pic of Kings)

Hairstylist: What, really? But that’s your average boy’s cut.

It’s a very masculine cut.

Me: He’s a BOY.

Hairstylist: (looks down) Right. Well… Some mums like cute cuts, what… You really don’t want Mushroom Head (pointing at Rockstar’s current style) anymore? You don’t think that’s cute?

Me: No. That was an accident.

And yet… they still give him a pink covering…

Either they a) don’t listen b) can’t understand my crappy Cantonese or c) think I’m Psychomum who wanted a boy so badly she is still in denial about her delicate-featured obviously-a-girl child.

And the extra arm in the picture belongs to our Local Friend Who Discovered This Place And Ferried Us There, because Rockstar will not sit still, thank you very much. (Eagle-eyed readers may notice he has switched cars since they started cutting.)

“We held our (now 14 year old) son down when they did it,” our friend volunteers. I look around. There are other patrons in the shop. It’s quite likely Rockstar has a screamfest resulting in us leaving the shop with Half A Mushroom.

In the first place he probably prefers to be Shorn Or Not, period. Before I can say anything, the stylist announces he’s done. Took maybe 10 minutes. Rockstar changes cars 3X – right before, then twice after, just for the heck of it. (After he’s done the stylist disappears and we’re left to change cars all we want.)

See? A. BOY.

Then we explore the area… (Is it just me or does this look like any neighborhood shopping center in Malaysia, except for more Chinese words?)

We decide to give Rockstar a real ride before we leave (just so it’s easier to bring him back) and there’s an arcade in the larger shopping center about 5 minutes walk away…

We cut thru Lam Tin MTR station…

(There seem to be giant ie several stories high outdoor escalators all over Hong Kong…)

And there we are…

(Oh, and the cut was HKD 59…)

Rockstar spends all his tokens on just one ride – the sonic hedgehog police car where he offers a local Hongkie boy rides. They have a blast, Rockstar driving, the older boy shooting at bad guys from the moving vehicle. No one knows how to control the darn car  which just keeps spinning, and when I ask the boy’s grandfather, he says “I have no idea  either, my grandson has just brought me here for the first time,” in the accented Cantonese of a Mainlander…

We meet many older folk who have that accent, whereas their kids and grandkids don’t…