‘Angels with scissors’ a cut above the rest

There’s nothing like a fresh haircut to instil happiness and confidence in a person, and people in need experienced this for free thanks to a community hairdressing program at Vinnies Inala Family Support Centre.

Qualified hairdressers from Hair Aid Australia’s Community Cuts program visited the Inala centre in October. The program provides free hairdressing services to people in need.

Vinnies Centre Coordinator Liza Dykstra said the visits were an extension of the support the facility provided to the local community, having already assisted more than 8000 people in 2018.

‘We thought it would be really great to have at our centre because it’s so hard for people to find money for food and to pay bills and to get a haircut can be really expensive these days,’ Ms Dykstra said.

‘They just can’t afford it, so it was great we could give them a bit more confidence and a hand up.’

Ms Dkystra said the program had been well received by visitors to the centre.

‘It’s been a great success—there’s a lot of happy people. They were even mingling and making friends. I saw two in the hallway give each other a cuddle; one of them was struggling with bus fare to get home and the other lady gave her two dollars to get her bus—it was so sweet.’

Patron Violet Ksiezopolski, who had not had a professional hair cut in over two years, said getting a free hair cut was a joyous experience.

‘I was in here today asking for some help with groceries and a lady pointed to a notice on the wall and I thought, oh, what a great idea. I normally cut my own hair because I can’t afford to get it done professionally,’ Ms Ksiezopolski said.

‘When you are cutting your own hair, you can’t see what you are doing and it doesn’t always turn out as you’d like it to. So, the fact that someone professional is doing it is going to uplift me and make me feel like I am somebody.

‘Services like this make for a happy day for me. They are angels, angels with scissors.

‘I’m going to go out with a smile on my dial today. It means the world, it really does.’

Hair Aid Community Cuts is planning to return to the Inala Family Support Centre in December.