The boys get a haircut in Vietnam

Yes long-term world travel is fun, exciting and overall a pretty good way to live your life. But it’s not all glamorous jetsetting and lying around on beaches. You still have some of the same ‘admin’ tasks that you do at home. Like dealing with the endless sweaty laundry, monitoring how often your children pass a bowel motion (parents you’ll understand this one), nagging them to eat their fruit and vegetables even when they’re foreign ones, and getting a haircut.

We’re nearly 6 weeks into our trip and the boys were starting to look a bit shaggy. The time had come to tidy them up and get a haircut.

We found a barber in Hoi An, Vietnam to do the job. Not only did he do haircuts, but shaves and ear cleans as well. Mike thought he was getting the first 2, didn’t realise number 3 would be thrown into the mix as well. Here’s a little photo and video essay of how it went:

 

Hmm here’s a barber. “How much for a haircut for the two of us?” “150,000 dong (or $10 NZD / $6 USD ) . The barber gets out his book of testimonials “Look, look I show you the man from New Zealand who liked his very good haircut”. Scott from Christchurch was indeed happy with his haircut. OK let’s do this.

“Ok Dad, I’m going to have a number 2 all over. What are you going to get?”

 

The barber pulls up his chair, puts a plank of wood across the arms for Jack to sit on and wraps an old sheet around him. Jack in his short life has only even been to ‘Just Cuts’ in Royal Oak (next to Pak and Save in case you were wondering), where some young chick cuts his hair, and he isn’t quite sure about THIS scenario….

 

Next out comes the shaver. He isn’t moving a muscle. Good boy. ‘Those blimmin parents of mine, dragging me half way around the world to get my hair cut in a dump’ he’s thinking.

From nowhere Mr Barber whips out his scissors and proceeds to try and get into the Guinness Book of Records for number of snips per second. Check this out:

 

Next it’s Mike’s turn. Pretty straight forward shave of the head…

 

Then it’s time to lie back and lather up for a shave.

Out comes the cut throat razor. The kids are instantly intrigued. What is that thing? What is that guy DOING to Dad?!

And then it was time for part 3 of the service. Ear clean. Barber man dons his miner’s lamp and with a few dental-like looking instruments begins to delve into Mike’s inner ear. Sophie is fascinated.

Then it’s all done! The boys are looking sharp and Mr Barber is happy with a couple more satisfied customers. And we can tick that chore off the list for another 6 weeks!

Footnote: The girls will also shortly require haircuts. We will do this in the serene atmosphere of a proper hairdressers in a shiny mall in Kuala Lumpur next time we are there 🙂