The Day I Got a Haircut

Since coming to Gwangju, I've been getting my hair trimmed using the #KakaoHairShop app. It's not that I use it in any special way; it's just that I use a salon that happens to be registered among the ones nearby. Still, it has the advantage of being convenient, since you make a reservation and pay in advance, then go and just get your 'hair' cut, and everything is done.

The place I go these days is 'Miinnara Jeondae Branch.' Rather than saying I go there these days, since coming to Gwangju I've used the app three times in all, and all three times I went there. The first reason was that it had a large number of 'reviews,' and from the second time on, after chatting with one of the stylists, A (since I'm anonymizing), I got the feeling it would be fine to keep coming here, so I did. On the second visit, I happened to give A some relationship advice. It was nothing major; it was a story about how the relationship with a certain acquaintance (friend) was giving some stress. With my hair entirely in their hands, I played the role of an empathy bot for a little while. And afterward I said I would recommend a book when I wrote the review. The book at that time was 'I Decided to Live as Myself.' Somehow it seemed like a person who needed this book.

And then today, a month later, I went again to get my hair trimmed. As soon as I arrived I said hello, and we talked. To be precise, I listened to the stylist's story about reading and the aftermath of reading. The stylist said the book's content was really good, that it was their own story, that their relationships had been sorted out nicely, and that they'd thought about bringing the book today but decided it would be too funny to go that far so they didn't, and that today they were so happy because they'd left their phone at home and had no stress from anyone contacting them.

I said 'I'm so glad' to the stylist, who'd had a successful book recommendation and a success experience with leisure reading, and I was happy over something I hadn't expected. When I first recommended it, I wondered whether they'd even read the book, but later I found out they'd even written a short reading reflection in the review I'd posted, so my 5-minute counseling must have been a success... hehehe

I don't know whether I myself have an outstanding ability to listen to men. Well, with them you usually just need to do 'problem-solving listening,' so they may want a precise solution. But in most cases the 'precise solution' isn't with me; the 'possible solution' is with the person themselves. This is the same with women, too. Only, when I listen to women, I think I listen a bit more dynamically. The kind of listening that lets the other person speak.

Surely society now has more occupational diversity than before, and we no longer have to live lives bound to religion or bound to royal authority, yet it seems people still find it hard to live as 'themselves.'

Thanks to all this, I'm in a good mood today. There is the irony of writing a story about a book even though I didn't read one, but I think this much is forgivable.