dear diary

i am going out to dye my hair now.

i am feeling sooo....... nervous!

11/1/09 11:30am



i am back!
my hair is dyed a chestnut brown with a lil tinge of red
i protested for the choice of colour, but the hairstylist said to trust him.
i guess i did.

Sunday morning quickly came and I woke up feeling jittery, and the house was emptied for the trying to be fit family (who were mostly underweight and sedentary), except for me. I was in bed. Of course, I was sedentary and underweight too, or maybe more so. Was feeling tired from yesterday’s full day shopping and gorging myself at Bakerzin, amusingly not for its cakes, at the insistence of my closest friends. =D We ate and chatted and basically, every one was asking me to quickly go dye my hair as I have been bothered by it for a long while. I have seen others with tremendous changes from perming to dyeing and rebonding, to lasik and so on… I was in such a dilemma whether to dye or not, and not so much what colour to change it, mainly because I loved by black fine hair very much. I loved my black hair. But, I just thought I wanted some change to it. And very quickly, morning came and I found myself going for breakfast alone, and whilst queuing up for what seems the most popular store in the region, my bro who was just booked out spotted me and we ended up eating together. It was weird how he acted like a big bro, advising me not the dye my hair because it is physically damaging, because how I should not follow the crowd and because of so many reasons. Ha. NS is definitely teaching him something. And soon when my family walked back from their big walk, they joined in the protest. I stayed on to do some clothings just to hear some more rejections before leaving the house. The public transport took its time and I fell asleep briefly. And before I knew it, I was seated in front of the mirror and Brandon was snipping off my hair ends, before he asked what I was doing that day.

I looked through some colour palette and for once, did not realize how many shades can one brown make; From blond to ash to copper to red to chocolate brown. He recommended me some brown colour with a tinge of red in it to liven up my complexion, but I was very against the idea of RED. After much protest, I was bought over and he started mixing some clayish thing in a pot. So the colour job began. First, big chuncks of hair were clipped away while he sectioned sheets into 1 inched each, then slab on the milky mud looking goo onto the hair and painted it and rubbed it in, carefully avoiding the scalp, as I have forewarned him about my sensitive skin. What colour the final product will be like was totally obscure from looking at the mud. So he patiently sectioned and painted my hair while I flipped through the magazine with thin concentration. Somewhere in the middle of the painting, we started to chat and he kept making me laugh so that he could see my face blush. I couldn’t help blushing no matter how much I tried, especially when I laughed. It happened when I was a baby; my mum knows this better than me. When he finally finished painting the sheets, my head was covered with mud. The next moment, a halo was rotating around my head like I was the equator. I felt hot. And I felt hot for the next 1 hour, while Brandon went over to straighten a blond hair, he was a popular request. When all the globe-rotating thing finally ended, he checked my hair as though laser eyes could tell him the colour has penetrated. To me, I still looked covered in mud. I was seated at the basin and he started washing off the mud with cold water and I enjoyed the massaging of the scalp and rubbing. Somehow, I don’t remember my mum doing such a good job herself, but that was so long ago. I remembered my shampooing were more like yanking and bobbing of head around… no wonder I always felt dizzy after a bath. After a second shampoo, the treatment begins and I was left there ‘treated’ for a good 45 minutes. I almost fell asleep when somebody female came and washed off the stuff and I was seated back again at the mirror. And without warning or anticipation, the towel was removed and I saw, for the first time, my hair was not black. OH MY GOD! WOW!! I heard OSed in my head, and I couldn’t help laughing at myself in the mirror. What was worthy was the thrill of a first timer being surprised at the sudden change of look, as with all my friends’ experience. Then Brandon realized I was shifted and came back quickly looking offended that his customer was touched without his knowledge. And my hair was blowed dry, trimmed again at the ends to give it movement and neaten the layers. Then was the straightening-blowing part which gave the hair the shinny and healthy appearance. Not satisfied with the cut again, he adjusted the fringe and cut some more to give it even more movement. I thought I looked nice enough, but he continued to adjust the look. The hair stylist felt pretty proud of his taste and asked if I agreed. Yes, it looked like what I wanted. After the job was done, I was given some hair care advice and how to wear it, but I am sure I couldn’t have made it such salon-perfect style when I am doing my hair at home. I walked out of the salon feeling happy that I have finally done something, good or different, for myself, and the process made me feel good and relaxed. My hair looked so soft with a healthy shine, and the brown enhances the layers done while the copper added radiance to the overall look, with my fringe swept to the side, half covering my eye. I liked that I don’t look very different from when I stepped in, but somehow better. The first to see my new colour was my bro, and he insisted we shall go shopping together.



One day after my colour job, I reluctantly washed my hair fearing that I might loose the nice glossy shine from the treatment and neat layers from the blow dry. I would be happy if I could loose some of the colour to get a even more toned down chocolate colour, however the lather were all white. It is true that I cannot reproduce the salon-perfect hair myself, but just thinking about the experience of a first timer was happy enough. I liked that I had finally put myself through it and enjoyed the process and emerging looking very close to what I wanted and what I was intially ;)


happy new year! =)

11/1/09 11:30pm