Even though she is about half done, Gloria Yan sighs as she looks at the never-ending waterfall of soaking wet locks that are waiting to be parted, wrapped and rolled.
The low price of $10 will change one of Tiffany's most prized possessions- her hair. She is getting a home perm from her mother, Gloria.
Last night this kitchen table was a smorgasbord of food waiting to be brought out into the dining room. Tonight, packages of apricot colored perm rods, hair claws, combs, end wraps and a box of a home perm solution are sprawled across the kitchen table.
As Reese Witherspoon eloquently stated in the movie "Legally Blonde," the active ingredient in this product really is the ammonium thioglycolate. And as the movie states, the box reiterates; there is no hair washing for the next 48 hours, which makes Tiffany Yan cringe.
"Used by professionals," the box claims, but in this case it is anything but.
Tiffany's thick mane has been separated into thin, "roll-able" sections by Gloria. The hair has to remain wet for the process to work. She has been sitting here for the past hour, shivering and shaking, which only makes Gloria's rolls look even more amateur. Thin sections of hair are wrapped at the end and rolled from the bottom up and snapped into place atop Tiffany's head in what is supposed to resemble uniform rows.
As time passes, the tightness and quality of each roll improves.
"I've seen it done before," Gloria claims. "But this is still an experimental process."
Gloria scrounges around the bathroom and finds large rolls of cotton used to frame the crown of her head and nape of her neck that is already tightly wound in an old towel.
"I look like an old lady," Tiffany complains.
"I don't want to forget these," Gloria says as she snapped on a pair of latex gloves with some "ER" panache. "Wouldn't want to get those awful chemicals on my hands." Tiffany's eyes bug out in fear while Gloria ferociously shakes the first of two bottles that will be dumped atop Tiffany's head.
The first step involves the complete drenching of Tiffany's curlered head in the perm lotion.
Tiffany got a taste of why it is called a "cold perm." Her teeth begin to chatter as the perm lotion floods the rows of curls on her head. In addition to having her head first sprayed down with water and now cold chemicals, Tiffany begins to worry her sensitive skin may have an undesired reaction.
Tiffany's cartilage piercing is covered with cotton and her college T-shirt is soaked with solution, the "Peanuts" towel around her neck isn't helping at all. The combination of the toxic fumes from the chemicals and her contact lenses are making Tiffany's eyes water like the ending to "Titanic."
After what seemed like an eternity to Tiffany, 10 minutes were up and her head is being hosed down by the removable shower head like a dog being drenched during a bath.
As Tiffany toweled down her head and wrapped herself in a bathrobe in attempts to warm up, she asks "are we done?" Without a word, Gloria answers the question by saturating Tiffany's wet and cold head with the second step, the neutralizer. Gloria soaks Tiffany's head with the neutralizer evenly as if basting a Thanksgiving turkey. As the neutralizer quickly runs through the trails in between each curler and onto Tiffany's forehead and into her eyes, Gloria puts down the bottle and quickly realizes she has forgotten to replace the saturated cotton rolls, Gloria runs into the bathroom to grab more.
The second time around, stepping into the tub and hosing down her head with the shower head is practically a routine for Tiffany. Tiffany's hair has been soaked, parted, wrapped, rolled, doused with perm lotion, hosed down, drenched in neutralizer, hosed down again, and now, after toweling it dry quickly but carefully as not to move any of the positioned curlers, she returns to the kitchen for the final step.
Undoing the rollers attracts the attention of everyone in the house. Family and friends visiting for Thanksgiving take a break from leftovers to gather in the kitchen for the unrolling. Like a plastic surgeon unwrapping his patient's bandages, Gloria carefully unrolled the first curler. Choruses of "ooh"s as well as sighs of relief fill the air after a tendril of wavy hair springs out of the apricot colored curler.
Gloria rinses the used curlers and packs them and the 24 extra curlers that had not been used into a plastic box, perhaps for next time.
A very satisfied Tiffany stands in front of the bathroom mirror holding a hand mirror to see the back of her hair. Admiring the finished product, Tiffany whips out her new camera phone and sends a few snapshots of her new 'do to a few friends.
"I wonder if I can straighten my hair …" Tiffany asks herself as she spies the hair straightener that still lays on the bathroom counter.
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