The Village Hairdresser - Beware!

In Skalitsa we have a hairdresser and if anything is to go by she is not a good advert as she has a mustache herself. Her name is Donka an elderly Skalitsa woman has been running the business for 38 years and never had a complaint until recently.

Her surgery, sorry saloon, has not been decorated for 38 years along with the same chair. It is my opinion that she was the vehicle from where punk hairstyles were founded

When ever I get the chance I go there but only because she is my friend and being seen in the village. I doesn't matter as many others have the same style but don't complain so I don't complain. The cost was 1.50 leva for a short back and sides with little bonuses in as some sides are shorter than others.

The other service she offered men was a shave. Now I have never been shaved before by another person, apart from having my appendix out! This was a first for me and for a fee of 50 stotinki it is actually cheaper than buying a razor blade. Why doesn't everyone go there for a shave then? Well I was to find out.

A nervy man sat there with the old lady bearing a cut throat razor and that's just what I feared. The trouble is I wear glasses and am shortsighted so looking in the mirror facing me which is also 38 years old, I can't see what is going on without the spectacles. It really wasn't something I was familair as she proceeded with the shave.

Funny I mentioned surgery by accident earlier because it was a general anesthetic that was needed before thew process began. but I this was all new I thought this is how it was having a shave with a cut throat razor.

When she had finished home made rakia was slapped on my face (ouch!) and I was asked to wait in the chair while we talked. Then a damp cloth was wiped and I was free to go after paying.

On myt way back along the Sklaitsa streets as usual it took a lifetime to get there meeting friends and neighbours en route stopping to talk. The strange thing is they normally ask me where I have been and what I am doing but today they knew where I'd been this time so just asked me where I was going. I wasn't quite sure how they knew until I finally got home.

Looking in the mirror there was a blood stained face staring back at me it looked like I had been treated and subjected to the torcher of a thousand cuts but all in the same area. Well for 50 stotinki was at a cut price and that's exactly what I got. No wonder everyone knew where I had been.

Don't just ask me my brother went there a few weeks later with sideburns Elvis style on one side and the original Black Adder style on the other. His face also looked like it had been through a mincer, you could have made black-pudding with the amount of blood that was seeping out! The only difference between his episode and mine was that he complained!

I still go there for a punk haircut but never for a shave even though she considers herself a cut above (and below) the rest.

A final thought came around that hairdressers used to be the wounded soldiers butcher of war but surely that was more than 38 years ago.