Cheap Snips

DEEP in the heart of Kuala Lumpur, in a lorong off Jalan Tuanku Abdul Rahman, is a colony of Malay barbers which has been in existence since the city's Great Flood of 1971.
There used to be 15 small wooden shops, but there are only 13 now, although they are bigger in size. Two of the lots have been converted into stores selling textiles and headscarves.
There are definitely great movie script prospects here, too - P. Ramlee Bujang Lapok style, perhaps.
The barbers not only offer possibly the cheapest haircuts in the city at RM10, (depending on the choice of style), but they also have interesting stories to tell.
Take for example Shamsuddin Japri, Ashaari Mohd Dani and Suldi Junaidi of Sentosa, Lot 5, of the colony.
Shamsuddin, 58, the eldest of the trio, is popularly known as Charlie Din.
"Ramai sangat Din masa tu. Masa muda, pakcik ada misai tebal. Orang kata macam pelakun Holly wood tu, siapa nama dia? Charles Bronson? Dapat nama ikut dia. (There was one too many Dins then. When I was young, I had a thick moustache. People said I looked like the Hollywood actor... [Charles] Bronson. I got my name from him)," the now clean-shaven Shamsuddin offers by way of explanation.
Ashaari, 53, is Jimmy Din. No reasons are offered as to how he came by such a name, nor is there a resemblance between him and the late Hollywood legend James Dean. Ashaari has been a barber for 30 years.
Suldi, 47, has been in the trade for 15 years, and is in fact related to Aziz Sattar, one of the Bujang Lapok stars.
"Sedara sebelah emak saya (we're related on my mother's side)," he says, speaking with a slight Javanese accent, adding that Aziz still drops in occasionally for a haircut and a chat.
Looking back, Ashaari says the shop started out with only two chairs and a wall-mounted fan to keep the air cool.
"We asked to extend the shop and City Hall allowed us to add two more chairs and we have since installed air-conditioning units."
The barber chairs were imported from China and Japan. A brand new one costs as much as RM4,000 while a used one can be had for RM1,500. And if these chairs could talk, they'd be able to tell you a lot of stories, Suldi says.
"Menteri pun ada (we have ministers too).…”
Minister in the Prime Minister's Department, General (Rtd) Abdul Hamid Zainal Abidin is apparently one of Sentosa's regular customers.
"He'll call from Putrajaya to tell us that he'll be coming in and that we should wait for him," Suldi adds.
A haircut used to cost RM7 until a few years ago, and a shave RM5. Sorry, no "wash and blow-dry" as there is no water.
"Kalau ada, kami pun boleh buat (if we had water, we could offer that too)," Ashaari says.
The three gentlemen have also had their fair share of difficult customers.
"Customer cerewet, kita buat apa? Kita senyum saja (what can we do if customers get difficult? We just smile)," Ashaari says, flashing his pearly white teeth.
Arabs, he adds, are by far the most difficult patrons. "There was one Arab customer who insisted on checking in the mirror every time I made a snip. How could I finish cutting his hair when he kept doing that?
"Another customer insisted on combing his own hair while I was cutting it. We've been cutting hair most of lives yet we still have customers telling us how to do our jobs."
For Shamsuddin the biggest challenge, rather ironically, is when a customer offers no instructions and simply leaves the style of trim up to him.
"I find it rather tough when they tell us just to cut their hair any way we please. I've asked customers what they'd do if I were to shave them bald, and I've been told just to go right ahead. They trust us to make them look good."
All three barbers take pains to ensure they look presentable too.
"We are in the service industry. When we look good, our customers will feel good too," Shamsuddin explains.
The barbers also receive customers who ask for haircuts that make very little difference to they way they look. A simple trim is all they're after.
Most customers come in during lunchtime or after office hours, but some come in during working hours.
"Once, we had a customer who came in during office hours. I was busy cutting his hair when his superior walked in. We were later told that when they got back to the office, the officer was told to fill up a borang cuti (leave form) as he had been away from the office for half of the day."
Ramadan is easily the busiest month for all the barbers here.
"There's no such thing as rest the week before Raya. Everyone rushes in to have their hair cut," Ashaari says.
The shops are open seven days a week and only close once a year – for Hari Raya Puasa.
"We'd have to answer to our wives and families if we didn't close for Raya. And we don't want to have to do that," Ashaari says, with a laugh.
On weekends and public holidays, the partners take turns to man the shop.
Most of the time, they don't need to ask customers how they want their hair cut as the regulars tell them exactly how they want it done, even down to the clipper number to use.
True enough, an Iranian customer walks in and tells Shamsuddin, in perfect Bahasa Malaysia, "empat belakang, separuh atas" (four back, half top).
The numbers represent the mould of the clipper. "0" or "1" is for a close shave, "2" for a haircut that looks like week-old stubble, "3" is a crew-cut (of the kind sported by police recruits), and "4" a trim. There's even a style known as the chairman's cut.
"When a customer asks for that cut, we know he wants to look good. Nak segak dan bergaya (he wants to look good and stylish)."
At RM12, a flat-top costs a little more than the normal haircut.
"It's not easy to cut a flat-top. Macam landasan kapalterbang. Tak semua rambut boleh buat. Rambut macam dawai saja boleh. (Like an airport runway. It cannot be done on any kind of hair. Only on hair that's like wire)," Shamsuddin says.
Whenever one of them is free, he will stand outside the shop to usher in customers.
"In the past, when there weren't many barbers, you could see customers queuing up. Now, there are so many, we have to attract customers in.
"But this doesn't mean that we are competing with each other. If we have too many to handle, we pass them on to the barber next door," Ashaari say.
Business is brisk. In two hours, they have tended to eight customers. Then there are those who come in just for a chat. What about their own hair?
Suldi reveals that Shamsuddin is the only one among them who can cut his own hair.
"He stands in front of the mirror and runs the clipper through his hair.
He makes it look easy."