Excuse me darlin’… oh geez, you’re a guy!

So that tends to happen to me a lot. I'm short with long hair so people approaching me from behind always assume I'm a girl. Take this story for example:

A few years ago, I was attending a pre-marital counselling seminar with my wife, sister, and her soon-to-be husband, Stew.

After a long day of sessions and workshops, the day’s participants got together in a big circle and started chatting.

At a certain point during the conversation Stew left to go the bathroom. Upon his return he stood behind me and started lovingly rubbing my arms. (At the time I didn’t react, for you see, Stew is one of friendliest people you'll ever meet and I simply thought he was trying out a new, very gay way of reaching out to his future brother-in-law.) The arm fondling was quickly followed by a huge "whack!" on my back.
It was only when I noticed my sister pointing at Stew, laughing her head off that I realised what had happened:

After walking out of the bathroom, Stew had headed for the nearest long-haired Asian assuming it was his fiancé. Being the loving sort of fellow he was, he'd started stroking the Asian's arms in a state of blissful happiness - one that quickly dissolved into confusion as he found my sister staring back at him from across the room.

Realising his blunder, he'd attempted to make up for it by performing the manliest back-slap known to humankind.

Now how is it fair that I get mistaken for my sister - and get physically abused at the same time? Needless to say, I hope one of the workshops Stew attended was "how to identify your own wife".


Sometimes a person doesn't even have to approach me from behind. Countless times I've had a shopkeeper walk up to me and say, "Can I help you there ma'am?" only to go bright red in the face when they realise their embarrassing mistake. (Though I have used this to my advantage in the past to get massive discounts). Because of incidents like this I've had a mini goatee on my chin for the last few years - not because I think it looks stylish, but rather to give people a freakin' hint!

It may sound like I'm at breaking point, but I'm not. However, this whole issue has got me thinking that perhaps I should cut my hair short. The problem is, I’ve had long hair for almost a decade and it’s kind of grown on me (no pun intended).

Regardless, I’ve decided to leave it up to you by setting up a poll that’s due to close on the day of my fifth wedding anniversary. On that day I reveal to my wife (and the world) whether my hair stays or goes – a decision that could very well change the course of history as we know it!

N.B. Stew has never touched me indecently since, and we continue to have a healthy relationship based on not touching each other.

I make my own Rorschach in the shower

I know what some of you may be thinking at this stage, and believe me, that's not it.

As most of you would've worked out already, I'm Asian which means I'm pretty hairless. I shave about once every 2 weeks and the phrase "five 'o clock shadow" has never applied to me. I also don't sweat under my armpits - something I'll elaborate on in a later post. But despite being mostly hairless, there is one place on my body where hair grows like a weed and that's the top of my head.

Now, I'm an Asian man with long hair (original, I know) and the problem with long hair and having it grow so quickly is that I moult like crazy. I moult so much I was Moses's back-up plague in case the first 10 didn't work. On a good day I moult more than a dog that's just discovered it's wandered into the kitchen of a Korean restaurant.

What this means is that when I squeeze all the water out of my ponytail after taking a shower, I'm left with long stringy handfuls of wet clingy hair.

I'm sure all you long-haired freaks out there can relate and to you people I now pose this question: What the hell do you do with all that hair? I mean, presumably you've already turned the water off, and turning it back on just to wash crap off your hands would be a waste. You definitely can't just fling the stuff off your hands, so what do you do?

Here's what I do - I stick it onto the shower walls, and it ends up looking a little something like this:

Before you think, "Oh, you're feral!" realise that I do usually wipe it off after stepping out of the shower and into my undies. I say 'usually' because sometimes they end up looking rather artistic. Take the picture above for example. When I look at it, I see an old man crying because he's made out of hair. What do you see?

I write this post for I am determined not to be the only freak in the world who engages in such questionable activities. Join me, my long-haired brothers and sisters, as we seek to subvert the dominant paradigm of... not doing this sort of stuff.

Seriously, send me photos of your own hair murals to:
tomurai2776@gmail.com, and I will start posting them up here.

Together, we can make this world a hairier place.