A cut above

One of the more interesting and underrated intricacies of being an Asian American male is how hard it is to find a place that knows how to cut your hair. Back in my hometown of Milwaukee , there was one place my dad and I would always go to. When I moved out to Cincinnati, I went to Great Clips and kept trying different ones, hoping to get find someone who would cut my hair right.

I learned from a few of the barbers I talked to that Asian hair is one of the hardest to cut because it's so thick and straight. If you cut it the wrong length it sticks straight out. Asian women have the option of leaving it long. I guess guys do too (one of my barbers said my other option was to leave it long and put it in a ponytail… it did sound like it might work, but it just wasn't me). I've seen many Great Clips barbers struggle with my hair, sometimes taking a long time because they kept on having to fix and refix things.

I have found a place that I go to now. Amit, one of my Indian friends, introduced me to it… It's Martin's Barber shop in Sharonville. I go to one guy there all the time, because I'm always satisfied with the cut I get there. I also got a recommendation from another Asian friend to go there, and I happen to run into a 3rd Asian friend there too.

So that begs the question… how much untapped demand is there for services or products aimed towards Asians, and specifically the underappreciated Asian male?

Conforming our faces to Western glasses

There's this movie called Iron and Silk, where a white man goes to China to teach English... It talks about the culture differences and he gets to experience discrimination. He builds a nice rapport with his students, and one day they're talking about the differences between the Western world and theirs. One of his students says, "Your face... it's so 3-dimensional..."

I recently went to see the movie "Bolt" in 3-D at our local theater... I'm wearing 3-D glasses for this movie, and coming out of the theater I get these marks above my cheeks from where the glasses were sitting. This reminded me of how uncomfortable my safety glasses at work were... they wouldn't sit at the bridge of my nose and instead cut into my cheeks. This is because these glasses were designed for non-Asian faces. Maybe it's time we design safety glasses for Asians and stop trying to conform our faces to the Western world!

Frozen Pork Mini Buns - Any good?

So I was at Jungle Jim's, which is what I would describe as a grocery store crossed with Disney World. Fun place to go shopping, they have more international stuff that many of the mom and pop Chinese stores... all in the outskirts of Cincinnati Ohio.

I picked up a package of "Wei-Chuan" brand frozen pork mini-buns (there's got to be a "that's what she said" double meaning in here somewhere), figuring it could tide me over if I had any dim sum cravings.


After steaming in the rice cooker, I pulled one out, took a bite... and it was actually really good! Even complete with the juices that flow out of the bun, which gives it even more authenticity (Chinese people will know what I'm talking about). The meat had the right flavors, almost (dare I say) Chinatown like taste?