Well, I decided to shave my head today and went out shopping for a pair of shades and piercings. I'll list the events/reactions that occured.
- At the glasses shop, the store clerks gave a bit of a flinch when I walked in (AFAIK). They didn't seem that eager to help me until I started browsing the Ray-ban/Prada section. That's when one walked over and helped me picked out a pair of Ray-bans.
- At the jewelry shop it was much nicer because they were all women. I flashed a smile, they flashed a smile and even bigger when I purchased some diamond earrings.
- At work, the old manager had the look on her face as if a Nazi has just walked in. Of course she continued to show disapproval until I finally broke down and told her the reason and that MPB was affecting me. Even though at this stage I'm BBC; I have a lot of hair left.
- At the gym, all of the trainers pretty much ignored me. Before they used to give some smiles and say some greetings but today, nothing. Seemed like they were ignoring me. All the other customers gave me side glances and finally one trainer came and talked to me. She told me she'd like to see me grow out my nice hair again (little did she know).
In summary, not too bad. Japanese people prefer to gossip and snicker amongst themselves instead of actually confronting someone (which is ok, keep their opinions to themselves). But there's no doubt in my mind that they look at me and think that I'm either a bad person or just a weird person. Normal is out of the question. They fail to realize that if they watch American movies they can find A LOT of bald people as main cast or just background staff. I wonder what's more "weird", someone shaving their head or eating live octopus and fish
.
Guess living in a culture where being bald is less common and less accepted has it's disadvantages. But hell, I'm all positive because I'm waiting for people who cares about me for being me, not just my head.
