Breaking Gender Barriers

Trip Start May 09, 2005
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19
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Trip End Aug 01, 2005


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Flag of Egypt  ,
Thursday, June 2, 2005

Ok, so I'm not breaking gender barriers in some fantastic way...but it's small and monumental on some level. I was fascinated to find that here there is still the "old fashioned" barbershops where the men go for their weekly shaves and when necessary, a haircut. I've been with Anwar on several occasions and I love to sit and listen to the men gossip and watch the cheesy old Arabic films on the ancient television. I was also very shocked to see the men threading! For those who are not up with hair removal techniques, threading (which is not so popular among Americans but is among Indian friends that I have) is a method in which a piece of thread is fashioned into a sort of triangle shape and worked so that copious amounts of hair can be removed with the working of the triangular area. The hands hold the triangular area and the end piece of the thread is held in the threader's mouth. So their head kinda bobs back and forth as they work the thread around removing the hair. They use this to get those stray hairs on the upper and inner cheek areas of the men where a razor just isn't practical.

In any case, I hate plucking my eyebrows and am not great at it and I posed the question as to whether there would be a barbershop willing to take on a female client. After some discussion and much laughter, it was agreed that after dark I could come back to have my eyebrows done as the barbershop is no place for women clients. And so I returned with Anwar around 1am to have the procedure done. The infamous threading
The infamous threading
 I had explained that I only wanted my eyebrows done. I have been extremely blessed with blonde hair and don't have the burden that many women have of dark and copious facial/body hair. So I became a bit concerned when the man began to apply prepping powder to my entire face...surely he was NOT planning on threading every last hair on my face?! But I trusted him and the threading began. Yes, it was very painful. My eyes teared up and my sinuses became a mess. But I knew it was all for a good cause.

All was good until I noticed him threading outside of the boundaries I considered necessary for a mere eyebrow clean-up. He was threading my temples and I saw him move towards my upper lip. Now, as I've mentioned before...I've been blessed with blonde hair and never considered myself a "hairy" person. But what ensued was Anwar and the threader convincing me that I needed to have my entire face done and especially my upper lip. So apparently now I am a hairy white American! I have a complete complex about it now. But all that kept running through my head was my best friend growing up-her mother telling us that whatever you pluck is going to grow back in thicker and darker. I imagined myself plagued for the rest of my life with a dark bushy moustache resulting from a random threading incident in Egypt. Well, I wasn't going to have it. The man said, trying to convince me otherwise, "no problem, you smooth like baby butt for 2-3 months." Uh, no thanks.

Anyways, I convinced them to leave my facial hair alone and to stick to the eyebrows. I have to say, my $1 Egyptian eyebrow job is far superior to any $40 American job I've ever had done! This guy was really good and yes, my entire forehead is as smooth as a baby's butt.

If you haven't alredy, go back 1 entry to see the myriad of photos I've posted.
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