(Something came up today, so there's only one chapter.)
What Li Long hadn't expected was that, when he suggested shopping at the Stone City Department Store before heading into the mountains, Harimu and Talihaal bought mostly personal necessities such as toothbrushes, toothpaste, and soap.
With their hair cut, the two looked much like ordinary people from the plains-apart from their clothes, of course. Li Long had taken Talihaal straight to the hospital without even a change of clothes. In the hospital, it had been fine: everyone wore hospital gowns and looked much the same.
But once he left the hospital, his Zhongshan suit and somewhat shabby cotton-padded coat looked out of place.
Without the haircut and shave, people would probably have looked at him even more strangely.
That was why Li Long had taken them for haircuts after they came out-the barber at the state-run shop certainly knew his trade. With short crew cuts like Li Long's and their beards shaved off, they looked considerably younger.
Then Li Long took Talihaal to buy clothes. He had originally intended to buy Harimu an outfit too, but Harimu flatly refused.
After changing clothes, Talihaal looked quite different. He was clearly a handsome young Kazakh man. In terms of Kazakh features, he was even better-looking than Batai in that Altay show from Li Long's previous life-judged by the standards of his own ethnicity, anyway, since that actor wasn't actually Kazakh.
Talihaal was quite pleased himself after looking in the mirror, especially with his teeth. Brushing them these past few days had felt particularly good.
That was why he had wanted to buy toothbrushes and toothpaste.
Seeing Harimu and Talihaal buy such a big bag of toiletries between them, Li Long was amused too.
Did this count as changing the local lifestyle habits ahead