Goodbye to shampoo

Photo: Claudio Fuentes Madan

I have, as they say, “thankful” hair. I do not use conditioner, I use any kind of dye, and my costs for shampoo don’t exceed 2 CUCs. So far, every brand has worked perfectly: Sedal, Four Seasons, Natural, or Cosas de Botica are the national brands, and the cheapest, though they are always sold in CUCs. For a long time now, we have had to pay in hard currency—which never shows up in our wages—to wash our heads.

Last month it started to get complicated. For some mysterious reason the quality of the shampoo is in the toilet, I wash my head and it feels like wire. My friends said the same thing, it’s as if we were suddenly forced to buy “hard”, and quite expensive.

The comments stun me, an apocalyptic atmosphere catches me off-guard. While products constantly become more expensive and of lower quality, people speculate about the growing scarcity—if that’s even possible—the Daily Paranoia: there will be more power outages, all the imported products will disappear from the stores, rationing will end, the CUC will fall or rise (this bola*, or rumor, is the most unstable of all), they are creating new rapid-response brigades**, etc.

The worst thing is how little I care, I’m tired of the premise, “it can always get worse.” At times I question how much worse we can imagine our reality, how much worse our horrible social conditions can get. We don’t earn a decent wage, we applaud with adoring faces and scream like a primitive horde, we bear up under political propaganda, don’t dissent, live with double standards, don’t think, don’t talk, are suspicious, snitch, don’t write, don’t take to the streets, eat badly, can’t fix our houses, don’t travel and don’t wash our hair; and that’s not enough bad news? Things are going to get dark?

*Bola (ball): Rumor. Speculation circulating by word of mouth and trying to "guess" economic, political or social measures in the immediate future, most often in contradiction with the information given in the mass media.

Translator’s note
Rapid Response Brigades: Organized bands of people dressed as ordinary citizens who respond rapidly, and attack, anyone showing any sign of dissent in public.