A bald adieu
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A bald adieu

Woman donates hair in loving memory of friend who succumbed to cancer

A bald adieu

Forty-year-old Bangalore resident Josephine Sequeira (Joe) donated her hair in the loving memory of her friend Vinod Kharka who succumbed to cancer on May 10, 2019.  "Donating my hair and going bald was my way of saying my goodbye to Vinod," said Josephine.

Sequeira met hairstylist Kharka in 2007 at a salon in Bangalore. "Vinod was a passionate hairstylist, who was humble and considerate towards his clients. Our common interest in sports developed into friendship", said Josephine, a freelance sports management professional.

Kharka was Sequeira's stylist for more than 11 years. In a decade-long friendship, Kharka and Sequeira talked about the two different cultures they both belonged to. Sequeira was raised in a South Indian family and Kharka in a North-East Indian household. Their mutual love for sports was always a topic of discussion. "Every time we met, for my appointments, we would check on each other's family and those were dear moments to me," Sequeira added.

Credit: Supplied

Kharka was diagnosed with lung cancer in 2017. "It was both shocking and despairing. Vinod never expressed any pain all these years. This was the first time when he had shared something painful with me. Even during his last days, Vinod wore a smile on his face. Two years later, on May 10, 2019, he left us and I didn't get a chance to say good bye to him," Sequeira told CitySpidey.

To bid adieu, she donated her hair to an NGO called 'Bangalore Hair Donation’, associated with the Indian Cancer Society. "Both my father and my husband shaved their heads to support me," she said.

"After I went bald, I realised that hair is overrated. My bald look doesn’t change who I am. After all, beauty is about the warmth that a person radiates and the attitude that one carries. I realised that appearance makes no difference. We are conditioned to think a certain way and that conditioning has no basis, no truth. The only truth is what you feel," she added.