As my time in this country winds to a close, I think it is unfortunate that I am going to be departing with a relatively bad taste in my mouth but to be fair, most of that is towards the Thai immigration and government in general.
The Thai people I will miss and certain aspects of the economy even more so. For example: I have a dog and dogs need haircuts. I also am not a fan of cutting dog's nails because one time i cut too short and hit the "quick" and well, I'm traumatized by that more than the dog is.
Yesterday Nadi (my dog) got her second to last haircut that she will ever receive in the only country that she has ever known (she was born here.)
This is the "before" shot and I am a big believer that Nadi, and a vast majority of other dogs really don't give a crap what their hair looks like, or if they have too much of it. But Nadi was getting too hot when we were going for our daily walks that i've made longer recently because she is getting a bit pudgy.
So i went down to my local doggie beauty salon and just told the women who works there to "not make her a skinhead but other than that to just do whatever she thinks is best."
She came back from the shop with a silly bow on her head but she really doesn't like those things so I quickly took it off of her. I think they could have maybe made her more glamorous, but this is not a fashion choice on our part, this is just so she can be more comfortable... and I think she is.
The point of all this is that the process took 2 hours (I'm sure there was some waiting her turn in that 2 hours) and it included a full haircut, nail clipping, and a bath. The grand total cost of all of this was 160 Baht or around $5.
I just did a search with PetSmart, a major pet store all over the USA and for the same service, it would be near $60 and I don't even know if that includes tax.
So yeah, I am going to miss having access to what is pretty much the exact same service for 1/10th the price. It remains to be seen if cuts are as cheap in Vietnam because if they aren't, we will be familiarizing our home with some clippers. There is no chance i would ever include a $600 per year haircut budget into my dog's life because I wouldn't spend that much on my own haircuts.
What about you? How much is dog grooming services where you live?