When I first came to Japan, there was one thing I immediately noticed about the people here: their hair. It looks as silky as a Barbie doll's hair and as straight as hair can be, unfazed by the surroundings. It stays in place, with no baby hair or frizzy hair in sight. As I assimilated into the society here, I thought, “How do I have hair like that?”
It came with many different reasons. I wanted to look put together when I’m outside, I’m just a girl — I want to be pretty, and like many other students studying abroad, I have a desire to be accepted in the local community and be a part of it. Aside from the language and the social rules, I thought hair would be a help.
And for a moment it was. The least is that I gained more confidence as I hung out with my Japanese friends or even as mundane as going to the grocery store, surrounded by locals. But time ticks and things change. There came a time when getting myself together wasn’t as easy. And when I failed to properly do my hair, a sense of failure and worthlessness was eating me.
From that point on I started making excuses for myself. The rooted patriarchal society that came up with all of this expectation of beauty, the shallowness and surface-level thought process of constantly being concerned about the state of our hair, and many other similar thoughts were generated by my brain just to make myself feel better. Despite some points I made are actually true to a certain extent, I discovered a better approach to the situation.
Let your hair be messy. Let it get blown by the wind. Let it be greasy as the summer sun is up in the sky. Let it get as dry as it can be due to the winter air. Let all those baby hairs pop out and greet people you meet. Your hair is not supposed to stay in place.
As I realize this, I think about how it can be a metaphor for many things as well, including the biggest thing we can have: life. Our life is not supposed to stay in place, it’s dynamic, unpredictable, chaos at times, but there are also times when we have control over it.
We always have the option to keep life steady, just as we always have the option to go to the store and buy all those hair products to keep our hair in place. But, what’s the fun of it? How are we going to run by the beach chasing the waves without making our hair a mess? How are we going to lay on the grass with our friends, tickling each other without rubbing our hair into the dirt?
However, being in this day and age, surrounded by different kinds of idealism and way of life, I get that not everyone wants to have some chaos in life. But as a human being, I want to suggest one thing:
Be messy, be raw.
