Benjie Pena, or simply Benjie, 35, is from Liliw, Laguna. He has a nine-year-old daughter. His wife, Lailanie runs a ready-to-wear dress shop just across from his barber shop. Benjie, a self-taught barber, has been cutting hair since 1997. He shares the shop with another barber from Bicol and splits the 4,000 pesos rental a month. Benjie cuts and trims the locks of between 10 to 33 people a day. He once had 60 customers in one day and experienced leg cramps. Benjie narrated a time when he was just starting as a barber. He had forgotten to put the barber’s cape around his customer and he only noticed halfway. Benjie said he apologized to the customer who instead of getting mad, had a good laugh even though he was left with hair all over his shirt. “Tawa lang siya ng tawa”. The customer just kept laughing. The customer simply assumed that his shop did not have a cape at all.
