Tattoo Time!

Sorry Mummy...I got another tattoo....but so did Alex, it was all his fault! Heehee. Not really.

We had both been planning to get tattoos here in China and we had asked about it in Nanjing but there were only  couple and I happened to pass by one when buying stuff for Nayi at Confucius and it looked so seedy. I wanted to get a clean tattoo thank you very much. Through a series of unfortunate events we ended up in Shanghai, but every cloud has a silver lining I guess and since Shanghai continued to be fairly lame, the silver lining was finding a professional, English speaking tattoo parlour downtown at NanPu Bridge. 

Front of the shop.

So we went over to investigate and get quotes etc. about a month ago. The place looked very clean, very professional and it was managed by a guy called Dylan from Drogheda no less! So with good english, impressive portfolio and clean surroundings we were happy to make an appointment at this studio for the end of April. 

The lounge area. 

The tattoo room.

I like to get tattoo's from where I've lived, so far I have one from Belfast, Bournemouth and Paris. This time I went for a tattoo based on traditional chinese tattoos, but with a little me twist. The traditional tattoo is a carpe fish with water surrounding it, to tell the tale of how the carpe swims upstream and up a waterfall and when it gets to the top, it turns into a Phoenix. It symbolises wealth and prosperity. As most people know, I don't actually like fish/sea creatures at all, they're really gross and wriggly and just generally mingin'. But I really like the tattoo of a carpe and it has also been simplified to not look so fishy. The water has been replaced with clouds, which I've seen on lots of the architecture here in China and that Matt helped me design. 

And put it all together and what do you get? 

Alex also got his first tattoo here, a design he co-designed with an illustrator friend, on his right wrist, to represent the films he has completed and where his ingenious stems from! 

Brilliant Photography...again. 

Alex and Ting getting down to business.

The transfer.

The Ink.

Discussion with Ting and Dylan.

The Finished Piece.

Me, Matt and Spidey messin'

Nerves

Putting the transfer on.

The beginning. Ow.

Blood!

Did it hurt?

Alex was very relaxed and very cool about his, even though it ws on his wrist/inner arm...a very sensitive place to get a tattoo but he handled it like a man. Got a little hot at one point and his arm swelled up but he was grand. 

I, on the other hand, even though I already had a tattoo on my inner arm and should have been ready for the pain, was in complete agony. When she started with the outline it hurt but I was handling it...kind of. Then she got higher towards my underarm and it was getting excruciating! After the outline was done, she had to darken some lines. Ow. THEN she had to shade it in, more than I was expecting. AND THEN she had to do the darker shading. By the end I was sweating, wincing, flinching, shaking and even let out one little arrrrrh!!! But I survived and it looks cooooooooooool. 

Now alls we gotta do is wear cling film around our arms in this blistering heat.