One reason you should bring a translator to the hair salon...

is that there's always a possibility that when you attempt to say something like, "I want my hair just like that lady's, but without the bangs <sign language was required since "bangs" has not yet worked its way into my Chinese lexicon>>," you'll still end up looking like this:





(I'm not smiling because I really don't think I like them yet.)

Now that I'm sporting the same bangs I painstakingly grew out in the third grade, I've noticed that I nevertheless fit in very well with my Asian peers. Almost every cute, stylish school girl in Tianjin must've asked their hairdressers for the very same do. I guess this is as close as I'll get to "going native."

Actually, once I recovered from the initial shock of looking 15 again, I began to realize that many of the world's foremost role models are also jumping on the bang-wagon. If Jessica Simpson can pull them off, surely I can too, right?