Hair today, gone tomorrow

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You either have it or you don’t. And if you got it, unfortunately you can’t flaunt it. I am talking about facial hair, the bane of my existence. Don’t think I am exaggerating. There indeed are women who need constant help in this area. In my experience, there are three categories of Indian women (i am restricting my analysis to Indian women as I haven’t done much research on this subject among non-Indians but I have no doubt women of other races face similar issues) - (1) those who think the word ‘threading‘ refers to the act of putting thread through a needle, (2) those who have to visit the beautician once a month or less often to get rid of errant facial hair, and (3) the category I fall into - those who have to constantly worry about being mistaken for the Shoebomber.

Sometimes, thinking about the torture I put myself through in order to look presentable, I am confident I can sit through an FBI torture session and not flinch an eyebrow. That’s what a life time of threading, waxing, bleaching and electrolysis will do to you. Oh yes, I have tried everything possible under the sun. I remember the first time I tried bleaching. I was living in Chennai and on my first job out of BSchool. I had never tried bleaching my face before but had seen others getting good results from it. So I went into a Lakme beauty parlor in good faith and came out with a milk mustache over my lips. They bleached me to such an extent that my normally dark hairs had turned completely and unnaturally golden, in a chocolate brown face! That was my first and final foray into the art of bleaching.

I discovered threading soon after and for years I depended on my neighborhood beauty salon to make me hair-free. The salon owner probably purchased a flat in Malabar Hill and sent her kids to private school purely from the income generated from my depilatory needs. But as the popular saying goes, all good things come to an end. I moved to the US, to a strange city where I knew no one. Those were the days when there weren’t many Indian families in town and we only had one Indian grocery store. My salon lady in Bombay had armed me with some thread and taught me the basics but that only went so far. Like an inexperienced shaver, I would have nicks and cuts all over my face from pinching the thread too hard. Determined to find a solution, I asked some colleagues at work and one of them suggested getting an electrolysis. Permanent hair removal, that sure sounded tempting! So off I went to a technician and she worked on my face for a few weeks. Until of course I started noticing some dark spots on my chin. These dark spots grew to big circles, and very soon, the entire lower part of my face started developing a light grey shadow, like a permanent stubble! That surely wasn’t the look I was going for

Thankfully, soon after, the Indian population in my town multiplied and we managed to get our own Indian style salon. I finally had my threading source and life was back to normal. Until I decided to move to Europe for a few years. Now, if I had chosen a place like London, then I would have had no trouble finding a threading salon. But Brussels was the city I chose to move to and it wasn’t exactly threading central. Add to that the complication of asking for help in French/Flemish! So once again I was left to my own devices. On a trip to Wal-Mart, before leaving for Brussels, I chanced upon a new epilation device - pumice stone for the face! It looked simple enough. Came home and tried it on a small area and it worked beautifully. I put it safely in my travel pouch, eager to try it out once I reached my destination. The night before my first day at work in the new office I tried the pumice stone and it completely erased all the hair from my face. It even made my skin look really smooth. Convinced that I had hit the jackpot, I fell asleep that day with a smile on my face, thinking about all the extra baguettes and coffee I would be able to afford by not having to thread any more. The smile vanished the next morning when I saw what I had done to my face -in my enthusiasm the previous day I had probably rubbed my skin too hard and the skin under my nose had turned purple! There were two huge black blobs above my lips and around my chin. HG completely blew his gasket when he saw me that morning. He kept warning me the previous night about the dangers of trying something new just before my big day, but I ignored him (of course!) And he had been completely right. I went into work looking like a train wreck. I am sure my new boss had serious doubts that day about his decision to move me from the US. And I swore from that day onwards never to try any untested hair removing technologies, especially on my face.

Now that I am back in the US, I am continuing my weekly donation to my threading lady. Where would this cottage industry be without regulars like me….hirsute women made to feel normal week after week, and for this I am grateful to the humble thread.

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