What for many of us living in Barga would be just a normal occurrence, for Jesse Henry going and getting his hair cut this morning was an event filled with great significance.
Jesse who carries an Irish and Canadian passport but these days, hails from Maine, USA walked into Chiappa the barbershop in Barga Giardino sat down in a chair and waited his turn to get his locks sheared.
He came well prepared, exceedingly well prepared, as he knew all about Antonio Chiappa’s salon where the decor of the place has changed very little since 1926, his magic scissors and of course, his “particular” way of cutting hair.
Jesse before, during and after – in the second image we can see him still thinking that he could influence Chiappa in some way about just how the haircut should be.
Jesse and his partner Heidi Burden are enjoying a well earned holiday here in Barga away from their hectic lifestyle running a series of hotels and restaurants in Maine, USA (site here) but before they arrived he spent weeks on the Internet looking for information about Barga, its culture and its people.
So well-informed was he that the day they arrived he was able to go directly to Aristo’s bar to join in the energy saving event ( article here) – it was there that he saw Antonio Chiappa dressed as a cyclist from the late 50s and early 60s and ready to pump the pedals and keep the lights flowing.
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The full immersion into Barga Society would not be complete until Antonio had also shaped his hair.
Clicking on this link: (article here) will take you to another article about Antonio already published on barganews last December where you can really get the feel to the place as he shaves one of his customers BUT be sure to come back to this page afterwards and click on the link at the bottom of this article to listen to Jesse talking about just what it is that attracted him to this area, his experiences in Siena and how delighted he was to find that in part, the virtual world compared favourably to the real world (or should that read the reverse? )
