Carol’s Column

When hair should never happen

THE place is ritzy. Pink and red brocade walls, flashing mirrors and a gathering of purple basins in a far corner.

There's frenetic activity everywhere except from the blonde receptionist with the glitter beauty spot who is filing the fourth nail on her left hand. Which is why I have been waiting for 15 minutes.

I announce that I am waiting for Cyril. Cyril of the magical hands, artistic vision and creative genius.

She ignores me, her attention concentrated on her little fingernail.

I inform her my appointment is for 9am and it is now 9.30am. She looks down her nose and waves me to the back.

I wander through the interior with its swinging decor and diminishing light and see a basin shimmering in the gloom.

Thankfully, I make my way to it — and there I sit for the next hour.

Dare I ask which of the several tight-bottomed, silk-shirted, prancing little people flitting round waving combs, is Cyril?

Eventually a young lady — or is it a man — in lilac and gold asks me who is doing my hair. "Cyril" I answer breathlessly. I might as well have said "God."

She tells me to don an overall. "The scarlet flowers are Cyril's."

I emerge resplendent in scarlet.

"Sit down," she says. "Back or front?"

Is she being personal? I am no raving beauty, but most people can tell which side my face belongs. "Back or front?" she repeats.

Understanding happens with a flash. "All over. I want my hair cut all over."

She withers me with a look from under her false eyelashes. "I mean a back wash or front wash (pause) Modom."

After my hair is back-washed, I do not endear myself to her as I politely decline a massage, conditioner, herbal tonic and dandruff treatment.

The atmosphere is distinctly cool. She directs me to a chair.

I have now been in this salon for two hours and I still don't know which of the skeletal figures is Cyril.

The genius who will transform my lank locks into a shining halo of glory.

Now two hours is a hell of a time to wait for anyone, but my friends in the know say: "You can't go anywhere else. Cyril is an artist. He may keep you waiting, but it's worth it."

In desperation I approach one of them. "How much longer will I have to wait?"

He scuttles off to a corner and consults a shadow holding a pair of scissors. The shadow beckons imperiously. Could that be the great and wonderful Cyril?

"She's in a hurry."

"Aren't they all?" sighed Cyril.

Cyril of France, late of Witbank, before that Pofadder, fingers my hair.

He makes the usual remarks. "It's lifeless, it's too fine, it's terribly cut, did you cut it yourself?" (No dear Cyril, I went to Guiseppe of Italy, your predecessor).

"And oh my God, the colour."

The one thing I like about my thin, lifeless, badly-cut hair, is the colour.

"I've always had black hair. What is wrong with black hair?" I sound aggressive.

"Black hair is aging, passe, dead. It kills a face. It's ugly."

Cyril clutches his shoulders in pain and shudders. "It needs beautiful, rich warm highlights. I will turn your hair into a halo of Titian curls."

The gift of the gab, has Cyril. What woman can resist the promise of beauty?

Which is why, one and a half hours later, I am sitting with a rubber cap on my head being highlighted. Neanderthal-like with a million silver tin foil spikes sticking out of the cap that in turn pushes my forehead down on to my eyebrows. Will my skin ever unfold?

I watch Cyril in action and decide that for all these years, I have had the wrong approach to my hairdresser.

He is not just the man who cuts and sets my hair. He should be my friend, my confidant. The artist who will guide my destiny.

Eventually the cap is removed and my hair once more backwashed.

My beautiful black hair looks like dirty rust. Cyril is delighted.

"It has depth," he murmurs.

He twirls his little brush backwards and forwards, skilfully manipulating my hair while he blow-dries it.

I am silent. A total social failure. I cannot think of one scandalous thing to tell him. Other than: "We have rats in the roof," or "My third son sliced his finger off in the salami machine."

Eventually, at 1.30pm, I am ready to leave. Precisely four and a half hours later.

At home that evening, I can't wait for the man in my life to return. Will he recognise his wife with the sparkling, glamorous, sensuous new image?

The door opens. He enters. And laughs.

On such foundations are a good marriage built.

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