My trip to London was a little more eventful this time than the last, not only was I on a modification mission but along with my partner we had another mission in mind.....food!
Last time my trip to London involved a miserable stroll around camden with my partner who gets easily agitated in crowds (great combination) Not only was my time there spent reminiscing how much the place had changed and where was that guy with the bird noises? But it was saddening because it used to be a really enjoyable trip made every year with my nan and mum enjoying the alternative side of fashion. The only two shops that added light last year for me were Sei Sei and Cyberdog....for Karl it was a little food stall named Bang Bang chicken, which he swears is the best food on earth.
Which is what our second part of our trip to London was for, as we strolled past every typical market stall, we passed the one that had Bang Bang chicken above it as it was not by the docks as it usually was so it threw us off... It was only when we crossed the bridge that we seen the docks boarded up and inaccessible to public now. So after continuing to Cyberdog (do they ever have dancers in there anymore btw??) and not even bothering with Sei Sei we headed back to the stall and found it was the one Karl fell in love with.
As the guy took Karls order I said to him that the reason we were in Camden was purely for his Bang Bang chicken, and the look on his face was wonderful, he went from being neutral in expression to practically beaming with happiness (you know that genuine happiness that you can't contain?) he loaded up the container of chicken and gave us a free can and thanked us repeatedly. I felt that I had actually made the guys day just by a small passing comment. It was awesome :D
Anyways onto the eye tattoo experience. Since the location was to be kept private from social media I wont disclose where we were exactly but here is how the day went from the arrival.
Over messenger I was given the address and told to keep it strictly private and to tell nobody anything and that he would explain why when I arrived.
So me and Karl arrived at the address and walked into this narrow door way between two shops. The walls were pink and burn marks stained the back wall where a dingy red tinted light was. The short hallway lead to the stairwell. On the wall near the door on a a4 piece of paper was the word Models with an arrow pointing us in direction, I thought nothing of it and after going up two flights of stairs for 'models' Karl practically dragged me back out, he was very disgruntled.
I asked him what was wrong and he told me that we had just walked into a brothel! I laughed at him, and told him not to be stupid, and as he got more irate he dragged me back in up to the fist level where the door had a sign saying 'if you come up in pairs we wont answer, if you knock and get no reply I am busy please try another model upstairs.' So I stood there and argued maybe they were doing shoots and he dragged me to the second door up another set of stairs which had advertisements for what they done 'dildo shows, anal sessions, uniforms, sexual fantasies etc.' he dragged me back out and managed to convince me. He pointed out people in a shop across the street staring at us and speaking, some of them giggling.
Obviously concerned, I phoned up the artist and asked if I was in the right place, his response was that I was and to wait outside he will be there in ten minutes. Which left Karl worrying that this guy was going to take me into this place take my money and take advantage of me.
Anyways, about ten minutes went by and after showing Karl the picture of the guy he points him out down the street walking to us. He introduced himself and directed us into the shop NEXT DOOR! Turns out that he uses the studio next door every year for the past ten years and each year he secretly hoped someone would accidentally go in to the brothel.....We were the first ones to do it (drops head in shame!) to be fair though as the shop was under refurbishment it never occurred to us it could have been there as the studio was set up downstairs.
After having a giggle about the scenario we set to work preparing the colour for the eyes. I was tossing up between green or purple, and decided green/turquoise as I dye my hair red a lot and purple and red would look silly, plus I feel green is more elfen and forest like.
We did ask if we could film the procedure but were told no. Which is fair enough as I didn't realize how complex it was. We were expecting to only be there for half an hour. Here is a video of the procedue from another source.
How it works and what to expect:
I will try describe this like the artist though I may be slightly wrong: Basically your eyes are made up of different layers, the needle will pierce through a layer of oils between two gummy layers and ink will be injected.
When the needle is injected it will move your eye, and because it isn't your brain moving it the vision will go blurry and your eye will try to move back to position.
So during the process you have to look as far in a certain angle as possible and DO NOT MOVE in any way while the needle is injecting. Karl was told to count to 15 each time slowly and by the 8th second the ink should have been injected.
The eyes are then rinsed with water being poured into them, which feels wrong and then the ink is allowed to spread a bit before the next injection is done.
In my first eye it took 3 or 4 injections to cover the majority of my eye and took around ten minutes to do.
However the second eye (my dominant eye) the first three attempts were unsuccessful as the ink didn't stay in due to firm layers in my eye (which may have been caused by rubbing my eye too much when I'm tired) so trying to get ink to stay in was a nightmare at one point I was to look up and as he was about to put the needle in subconsciously me eye moved to looking directly at the needle which ultimately put me off and I think it scared him how close it was too. After this happened it was near impossible for me to keep my eye steady and after 2 more injections and 2 Valium like drugs that had no affect we decided to call it a day and meet up another time if the ink didn't spread fully. This was over nearly three hours of trying and at least 8 times injecting the eye.
How did it feel?
Uncomfortable and mentally challenging,
The procedure itself wasn't exactly painful physically, however the mental affects it has on you makes it so much more challenging. Having a needle being within eye range is more painful mentally than any physical needle I have ever had.
After the injections were done and my eyes were rinsed, it took only a couple of minutes for me to feel no affects from it.
On the way home through the tube however, that was unpleasant and I'm glad I had sun glasses as bits of dust easily irritated my eyes.
I am on my third day and the only irritation I feel is if I look in one direction it feels like a hair in my eye, that feeling is gradually going though and aside from that it is as though nothing has changed with my eyes. No pain, no gunk, no inky tears.
While I love the outcome of the experience, this is a procedure I would not consider redoing if I had more than one set of eyes, it's not like normal tattoos where you leave and think, ooh I want another one a month later.... This was an experience for me which I am glad to have done and if need be will get finished at some point, but it was an unpleasant experience that I wouldn't recommend undermining and doing just because it isn't physically painful.
As for the guy that done the procedure I fully respect him, his patience with me was fantastic and he was willing to do whatever necessary for me to be as comfortable as possible it was as though I had known him for a long time and I couldn't fault him for anything.
I decided to take a few pics to see what colours work well with the green (wigs are handy) I only upploaded one wig one as the others was even worse quality than the ones here. Due to my phone being stuck on record after dropping it and damaging it I had to use a different camera app which instantly smoothes or beautifies??? the image so if I look plastic it's because of the camera not because i was modified into a doll ;) I only uploaded one wig one as the others looked wrong =]
