(Don't) Stare at the Barber

by Akshay Mahajan

Glass store front, rimmed with wooden blue. Etched in red on the glass are the styles and fashions the "Hair Cutting Saloon" deals in. Barber shops in India are of two types: the corner nahee [barber] who sets up his unpolished mirror and rickety chair under some tall tree and the puccha [brick] barber establishment that employs several such masters of the trade. Scissors, brushes, stainless steel blades, and circular foldable plastic razors are the versatile tools of their trade. Inside the latter, men wait patiently on worn-out resin sofas, hiding their faces behind a local newspaper or a glossy gossip-spilling film magazine.

Stylised posters of popular Bollywood actors and screen starlets adorn the walls: if a film becomes a big hit, fans want to emulate their favourite stars' hairstyle. The rest of the atmosphere is taken care by an old pocket TV in a corner or a grungy loud cassette player or a small portable transistor radio.

Fascinating. A shop you may enjoy as if it were on a movie screen: watching, captured, even without getting too close.