“Those Were The Days”

When I was a child there were no Barbershops and Hairdressing Salons.

On Saturday mornings the barber would leave home with a scissors, comb, 1 pack of razor blade, a little brush, a bottle of water, soap, a piece of fabric, a tin of powder and two folding chairs. He would go under the mango tree and open the chairs. One chair for his customer and for his tools. One by one you would see men and boys going under the mango tree to wait their turn. After a hair cut or shape up the ugliest man would be looking handsome and neat…

Women would be heading to the neighborhood hairdresser’s kitchen. She had an ironing-comb, curling iron and a wet towel on the counter. The ironing-comb did not have a temperature gauge —hot, medium, or cool so the wet towel was there to check the temperature. The hairdresser would know if the ironing-comb was the right temperature by the sound it made, when the hot iron touched the towel. Those were the days and they were sweet days…