The Popped Collar and the Kentucky Waterfall

I don't follow fashion, cause frankly, if you have seen me dress myself, I obviously don't have the eye for it. My mother drilled me with the basics: I shouldn't wear brown shoes with a black belt (or black and brown together generally)... there was something else about dark clothes after labor day. OK, maybe I only know one thing about fashion.

Sorry, Mom.

I do know when someone is making a grave mistake, and the two realms listed in the title are growing in popularity in Turkey, among certain groups, and worth examining.

First, the popped collar. Where I come from, it is a hard look to pull off, even with irony in mind. Something about it screams "TOOL". So, imagine my surprise when I got into the elevator last night with a twenty-something kid next to me, his green polo outfitted for... well, I don't know what, really. I assumed he was American, and the blank look I received in return for the question "What part of the states are you from?", left me shocked.

It also brought back the memory of a poor choice made by a former room mate, Mustafa.

Some years back, a Spanish soccer player stepped onto the pitch with the newest look in futbol. My room mate was determined to have this variation of an old theme. Wikipedia describes it thusly:

The Spanish mullet is generally shorter and lighter than a classic mullet, only using the last inch or so of hair above the hairline.

The article fails to duly ridicule the look, but the rest of the internets accomplish that rather handily.

It took a great deal of work to change my Mustafa's mind (what is good for a futbol player is obviously good for any young male). We toured through these sites, and I enlisted an American woman to help convince him that it would ruin the good thing he had going.

This is one of those problems of coming at fashion from a different cultural background. I used to run at the Boğazici University track, sometimes when they were having American football practice. Huge guys, helmets, pads, who couldn't play for shit, but nonetheless looked the part, made me cringe. All my memories of asshole jocks came flooding back, and connected to things like popped collars, binge drinking, date rape, fraternities... twenty-two years in the states had tied those ideas together.

Imagine my shock when the football team was extra careful about staying out of my way when I was running. One player signaled to two others, who hadn't seen me coming, to make sure they cleared out of my lane.

Mullets and popped collars fall into the same category. They don't offer me the same information about class or social status that they can in the states. It's just another impersonation of something foreign.

All my prejudices are thrown off, and while this is probably a good thing, still... mullets?