Tokyo: Surviving a Japanese hairdressers, no orange hair please?

The wonderful array of orange, brown and black dyes in Japan (note, no blonde highlights..)

This morning I left mum to spend a relaxing morning in the Ceruluean spa (pool, Jacuzzi, sauna etc) and set off to find Watanabes hairdressers. My roots were getting sooo bad, it had become a necessity. I had gone to get my hair cut in a swank place in Kanazawa a few months back. I was planning to get a cut and have blonde highlights. I'm not that trusting of hairdressers at the best of times so I had even learnt the Japanese hairdressing lingo, see below;

• Burichi iremasen onegai shimasu- Please don’t put bleach in
• Ichi ban tsuyoi heteakara no hoka ni burichi- Strongest hair dye without bleach (I mean the lightest blonde you can get without bleach)
• Kami buatsui arimasu- I have thick hair
• Tabun motto takusan jikan irimasu- Maybe you need a lot more time
• Orenji kami hoshikunai onegai shimasu! - No orange hair please!
  

and I really mean that last sentence, no orange hair please! Most of the Japanese here who “go blonde” end up orange as they use a ton of peroxide due to their hair being so thick. Anyway I couldn’t believe how dumb I was in thinking that a hairdresser in Kanazawa (classed as countryside in Japan) would actually stock non-peroxide blonde highlights for Western hair, DOH!!!.

This brings me to Watanabes in Tokyo. I found the place on another girl’s blog . Firstly when you call to book they speak English, not only do they speak English they EVEN answer the phone in English, bliss!! The salon is smart and in a really cool area of Japan, Harajuku.

Reception at Wantanbe's

The Japanese lady Chie who dyed my hair was not only super “tokyo” cool and chatty but could also handle my stupidly thick hair, always a sign of a good hairdresser..

Watanabe's hairsalon

I came out feeling great, flicking my blonde curled locks all the way down Harajuku Street.

Address: Watanabe Hair Salon, 3-25-6 Jingumae Shibuya-Ku Tokyo, JapanTel: 03-3405-1188. Detailed directions (which I used and didn't get lost!) are on Julie’s blog.