Hair Style and Chinese Men

I remember my mom's dress.


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I think it is genetic, our hair is usually hard and strong as wire. To make it worse, it is often thick. Westerners' hair is light and etheral as the breeze blowing at summer night, our hair is thick and heavy like the good old winter wool jacket. Ok, perhaps I am biased, I never make peace with my hair. It is unruly, stubborn and it has mind on its own.

Chinese men are not particularly paying much attention to their hair style. I guess that's true for male animals. However, due to the tenacious nature of Chinese hair gene, a lot of my friends always look like they just got out of the bed 10 minutes ago.

My father is an interesting exception. On Sunday morning, he spent long time in our small bathroom, brushing his teeth, washing his face with hot water (he needed to boil water in a cattle for that in the morning, no one else can be bothered to do that in the cold winter morning. We all washed our faces in cold water until I left home for Canada where hot water is abundant). He would then apply the funny-smelled hair wax, carefully part his hair at the side with the 3:7 ratio. The resulting hair style is those you can see in the old movie when men still wore hats and open car doors for ladies. He has kept this style as far as I can remember.