Taipei-based hairdresser Ivy Chang (張立欣) last week completed one of her twice-a-year trips to provide free services to residents of two villages in Hualien County that can only be reached on foot.
Chang’s first appointment during the trip on Monday and Tuesday last week was booked last year with a farmer surnamed Chen (陳), who said that he learned about her services two years ago, but was too busy with work to get a haircut.
During her stay at Sapah Tadaw Mawna, a bed-and-breakfast near Dali (大禮) and Datong (大同) villages in Taroko National Park, Chang also applied her skills to the couple that owns the guesthouse, giving the husband a haircut and dyeing the wife’s hair.
Photo: CNA
The wife, Amay, said that she did not have time to have her hair dyed before Chang came because of her responsibilities at the guesthouse and on the couple’s farm.
Chang said that she tries to visit before the summer, when villagers are busy with work on their farms and tourists, and at the end of the year, so that residents can have a fresh look for the new year.
It all began three years ago after her first visit to the villages, where more than 20 households of the Aboriginal Truku community live at an altitude of 1,200m, she said.
During that first visit, a guesthouse owner in Datong found out what Chang did for a living and asked her for a haircut, she said, adding that it had to be done with normal scissors because Chang did not bring her kit with her.
“All I did was a simple trim and cut, but it made her so happy,” Chang said, noting how the guesthouse owner was excited to show her new look to her family.
When Chang returned a year later, she was met with great excitement by the guesthouse owner, who told Chang that she had been waiting in anticipation for the whole year for another haircut, the hairdresser said.
Words of Chang’s return also attracted other villagers, many of whom let their hair grow because of the lack of hairstyling services near where they live, Chang said.
Although the villages are just 10km from the nearest town, one has to climb two hours to reach Dali and another two hours to get to Datong, Chang said.
Most supplies are carried in by residents on foot because there are no roads connected to the two villages, where residents get their electricity from generators and solar panels, she said.
Chang had invited other hairdressers to join her, but she ended up making the trip on her own because they were all deterred by the climb to the villages, she said.
“I enjoy hiking, and giving a haircut is what I can do. It is relaxing to cut hair in the mountains. As long as I can hike, I’ll keep coming back to do it,” Chang said.
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