A dollar a hair?
p. 11 · Read in the full issue
Young Kailas Prasad had his hair cut in Fiji and it cost his father somewhere around $1,500.
But it wasn’t an ordinary haircut.
Kailas, aged 16 months, was taken by his father Mr Dhani Prasad, a devout Hindu, living in Waihi, New Zealand, to have his first haircut in a traditional Hindu ceremony.
The boy and his father had to wait in Fiji for more than two weeks before the ceremony could be performed. Mr Prasad, who went to live in New Zealand from Fiji 12 years ago, said that according to Hindu tradition the first hair was bad hair because it came from the stomach and should be cut out in a special ceremony.
His three elder sons, also born in New Zealand, have made the same trip and Mr Prasad hap pily footed the bill of several thousand dollars.
The latest ceremony would cost about $1,500.