Hair terror

I've always been afraid of hairdressers. This somewhat rational fear can blamed on my mother who assured me at age seven she was just going to give my hair a wee trim. Scissors poised in hand I'll never forget that fateful snip snip snip. I got up and walked calmly to the bathroom mirror to inspect the minor alteration. What reflected back at me was terrifying beyond words. A shorter than short pixie boy cut. Hair poked out at alarming and terrifying angles. 

Obviously in shock I ran around the house crying hysterically and deliriously yelling 'How could you?!?!' for half an hour.

The next six months were scarring to say the least. One day swimming at our local pool two eight year old slappers came up to me and asked 'Why are you wearing girls togs?' I cowered mumbling that I was in fact a girl but this was lost, drowned out by their catty laughter.

I've asked my mother in retrospect why she made me look like a mutant boy in fluro prints and floral pastels and she simply shrugs her shoulders and says 'low maintenance'. I now have long hair. Any thing too short and I am seized with fear that I look in fact, male. I lopped off my hair a few years back trying a cute bob only to be greeted by my (now ex) boyfriend at our front door who told me solemnly 'I don't like it' and then turned and shut himself in the lounge.

With my tragic and sorrow filled hair history I am now faced with a daunting challenge. I need a trim. I live in Japan. Most Japanese hairdressers do not speak english. Therefore I am quaking in my boots. I am not willing to revisit my boyhood. Wish me luck.

In bloom

Fantastic photos from the In Bloom shoot from Test Magazine. Fucking amazing!

Till 6 in the morning

I was lucky enough to party with the awesome boys of Tiddabades this weekend as well as some amazing residents from Yoga, Tokyo. Three trips to the combini for alcohol and one b.b gun too many before it was 6am in the morning and I was taking a somewhat hazy train ride back Shibuya. It sure was nice to hear some New Zealand accents though!

From black to pastel

I was having a really bad day today. Things just weren't working out how I wanted them to and a frown was attached to my face all morning. It's such an awful feeling and I realised it was up to me to choose how long I was going to indulge in my bad mood. Sometimes it's easier to say angry. I tried to do things that make me feel better. 

I said sorry to someone I needed to. 

I went and saw Hoishi, my supermarket man who is 70 and high fives me on arrival and departure. 

I bought coloured pencils.

I ate shoe cream (it's like an eclair)

I looked at pictures that made me laugh.

I rode my bike.

I patted a cat.

I wrote a letter to a friend.

I put fresh flowers in my vase.

I bought a train ticket for Tokyo.

I took photos with a new roll of film.

I feel better now.

The feast

Art 21. A great website.

"Ford’s meticulous paintings satirise the history of colonialism and the continuing impact of slavery and other forms of political oppression on today’s social and environmental landscape. Each painting is as much a tutorial in flora and fauna as it is as a scathing indictment of the wrongs committed by nineteenth-century industrialists or, locating the work in the present, contemporary American consumer society. An enthusiast of the watercolors of John James Audubon, Ford celebrates the myth surrounding the renowned naturalist-painter while simultaneously repositioning him as an infamous anti-hero who, in reality, killed more animals than he ever painted. Each of Ford’s animal portraits doubles as a complex, symbolic system, which the artist layers with clues, jokes, and erudite lessons in colonial literature and folktales."

Mirai Chan

Oh those expressions! Mirai Chan is super cute.  This has been captured by Kotori Kawashima, a Tokyo photographer who is commonly thought to be a woman, and Mirai Chan's mother (as previously stated on this blog). A book of photography details the intimate and often hilarious moments of this charming little girls life. Mirai Chan lives in a world of colour, curiosity, wonder and amusement. Dreamy!

Fukushima