Wanna Catch a Whiff of My Hair?

#NaturalHair #HairPerfume #Gisou #BlackHairSmellsGood

I am going to start off this blog by saying that I love things that smell good. Whether it is food, flowers, scented candles and many other things. I am a sucker for perfumes and there has been one that people on Tiktok have been raving about - The Hareem Al Sultan Gold Concentrated Perfume Oil. From what I heard, it smells like everything is going to be okay (in a luxurious way).

I own perfumes, scented candles, body and pillow mists. However, I recently learned about hair perfumes and know that I love

not only when my hair looks good, I want it to smell good too. Since I’m a short person and anyone who hugs me catches a whiff of my hair, it should be one engraved in their memories. It should confuse their senses. I’m being dramatic but that is what I want. You can imagine the joy I felt when someone on

Tiktok announced that there are hair

perfumes available.

I have thick, fuzzy, beautiful locs and I style them well, the hair perfume would just be a cherry on top. Establishments such as Gisou claim that it is better to use hair perfume on your hair instead of regular perfume because it is kinder to your hair and leaves it moisturized. Sometimes in the black community, we often use heavy products such as hair masks, shea butter and other heavy treatment including water, oils, moisturisers and hair gel or wax.

Gisou's Honey Infused Hair Perfume

Hair perfumes are not only there for their scent but they have really good elements that help hydrate and condition not only the scalp, but the strands as well. Unlike fragrance perfumes formulated with a high percentage of alcohol, hair perfumes use less alcohol as it is bad for hair. The main ingredient is water which is what really gives the hair moisture and helps the hair follicles grow.

As someone who enjoys smelling good and having everything around me smelling good, my interest was sparked when I heard about hair perfume. I think this is a great invention considering that a lot of women have long hair, wigs, braids, locs, or even haircuts that may attract a positive and pleasant response to our hair and can help us love and cherish our hair more. As black women we deserve to have such nice things simply because we are worth it and there are a lot of views and opinions when it comes to our hair, the follow-up compliment should be “your hair smells amazing”.

"Good" Hair is OVERRATED

#AllHairIsGoodHair #HairTexturism #Type4Hair #Type3Hair #NaturalHair #Locs

Chris Rock, an African American who creates humourous content about black women's hair and how they always relax or wear wigs because they are 'bald'.

In today’s society, hair is still a sensitive topic for black people. There are catego

'Pencil Test'

ries whereby if your hair looks or feels a certain way, it constitutes “good”. Although this has been a phenomenon in the United States of America by the black community, it has managed to permeate black communities in Africa and the Caribbean. We can see this through the hair chart. Although it is clear that this is a remnant of white supremacist ideologies, it is something the global black community is fighting against despite the internalised antiblackness and texturism.

I have experienced this as well, in South Africa, a country you’d expect to take pride in being black and having black hair. South Africa has a history of racism during the Apartheid system and things such as the “pencil test” were introduced. With such a strong history of marginalising black hair, it is time we talk about the marginalisation that continues within the black community as a whole.

Growing up as a child with long hair showed me the reality of black people and having preconceived ideas about black hair which seeped into my subconscious and as a result, I began internalising those ideas. These ideas were: if you had long and soft hair, you won a genetic jackpot, and you had mixed ancestry one way or another. A great example of this was the articles comparing Blue Ivy Carter and North West. Because I have what we call 4B hair, it means that I have a looser curl pattern compared to someone with 4C hair, so I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve been asked if I was mixed with something or if I was partly coloured. For some reason, it fascinated people I didn’t even know. Some would ask what I used on my hair for it to become “that way”, and I would tell them what I used for my hair but they would not get the results they were hoping for. Some hairdressers at Black hair salons would offer to do my hair for free just to touch my hair.

I noticed that this was not just a problem in South Africa. It was a global problem. I started watching a lot of YouTube videos that confronted this problem. A lot of African American men, mainly rappers, put women with “good hair” or racially ambiguous women with long loose curls while calling black women “bald”, referring to a stereotype that black women cannot grow long hair. This caused a lot of outrage on the internet and more people started talking about their experiences with hair discrimination as well as the privilege that came with hair that is not coarse or 4C. In South Africa, people with short, thick, and coarse hair began having an inferiority complex which led to a large demand for relaxers.

My hair shrinkage

When I transitioned to locs, I noticed that the loc community had problems of their own as well. Locs are seen mainly as a spiritual journey in the Caribbean and the US, however, many reasons follow as well. In South Africa, it is the length of locs that matters, not the health. Before I decided to transition to locs, I thought that locs were just a low-maintenance hairstyle and I did not have to comb my hair anymore. That remains true, however, I discovered that a certain texture of locs was put on a pedestal. My locs are fuzzy, thick, and healthy, and I did not think anything of it until a loctician commented on my locs saying that they were the best locs he had seen in his life. My boyfriend’s mom’s friend asked if I could sell my dreadlocks to her once I cut them because “they are the only dreadlocks I would buy. They are so beautiful!” I’ve also heard that my locs look like that of an African American which shows that African American people are the standard for South Africans when it comes to hair. I think there is a lot of unlearning and learning we have to do as black people in South Africa and move towards learning to love and glamourise our own hair and not that in proximity to whiteness.

https://video.wixstatic.com/video/00e9ff_218dd6813d604e939caf24aee84b8cd3/720p/mp4/file.mp4

Locs Saved My Time

#Locs #LocJourney #BlackHair

My natural hair before the transition to locs

Growing up in South Africa, I have borne the brunt of constant scrutiny and comments all my life, especially as a child who was known for having an extremely soft Afro. This is something that defined me. However, at some point, much like everyone around me, I started obsessing with length and YouTube kept recommending all sorts of food to put in my hair. The thought of it got tiring so I kept cutting my hair little by little. I eventually got to a point where I tried convincing myself that I was cutting my split ends when I didn't even know what split ends were supposed to look like. The power of social media. Eventually, a video about locs (known derogatorily as dreadlocks) made its way to my algorithm.

On YouTube, locs were seen differently in comparison to my observations in South Africa. On YouTube, they were beautiful, clean, neat, and an aesthetic of some sort. On Twitter and Instagram, girls with locs were praised and associated with deep spirituality, sage, and everything Erykah Badu. They were nature’s finest masterpieces. In South Africa, it was a different case altogether. It was a death sentence. If you do not want them anymore, you cut all your hair off. To me, this was a nightmare. I had always been known for having healthy and soft beautiful hair. It was a part of me that I was not ready to let go of and it was a part of me that a lot of people, mainly strangers, admired. Locs were seen as dirty where I was from. It was a hairstyle that was associated with traditional healers and Sangomas, who were also connoted as dirty individuals. As I grew older, this proved to be as far from the truth as possible. Social media unlocked a new world for me and I found myself scrolling for 3 hours watching people’s loc journeys, locking process, and combing out process. I did not think combing locs out was an option or that it was even possible but it turns out that all you need is a spray water bottle, lots of conditioner, and a rat tail comb.

"I'm definitely going to get dreadlocks,” I told myself. For two weeks, all I saw wherever I walked were people with long, healthy, and luscious locs. I even subscribed to @THEREALCHOLEY on YouTube. I was in awe. Besides, I was tired of combing my hair, spending a lot of money every three months on a new hairstyle, and having to spend hours in front of the mirror just to open one straight line from front to back just for pigtails.

I remember the walk my boyfriend and I took to the Rastafarians who stood by the pavement and did people’s hair out in the open. I was nervous. Was I going to look like one of those spiritual girlies on social media? I wasn’t into astrology or whatever journey they were on. My beliefs were not going to be compromised by my hair. I knew where I stood with God so I was good. They were loudly blasting what sounded like Jamaican or Caribbean music. The vibes were immaculate. My boyfriend felt at home as this was his forte. I described what I wanted to one of the locticians. He happily obliged. Most of his locks were tucked into a long black beanie. ‘Where do they get those?’ I asked myself. “I’ve had my locs for eleven years.” I looked at him in shock. “They are down my back. Almost at hip length.” This was fascinating to me. I started thinking about how that can be restrictive especially when it comes to styling. I felt the crochet needle tangle sections of my hair. It was not painful but it was firm. I touched the first one as soon as he was done. I looked at my boyfriend with approval. I was really doing this.

After about four hours, I was done. I was happy with the result. My locs were stiff but they were locs. “Wash your hair with dishwashing soap, not shampoo. Shampoos have harmful chemicals. Also, make sure that you get your hair redone after a few months because there’ll be a lot of growth. Based on my observation, your hair grows fast. It should be bra strap length in Year 2.” I took a mental note. I left the streets of Yeoville feeling like a new person. Who was I going to be now that I am no longer the girl with a beautiful Afro?

“Rasta!” Some man across the street shouted at me. I looked at my boyfriend in confusion. He chuckled, “I guess that’s who you’ll be known as.”

1 year and 3 months into my loc journey.

When I went back on YouTube, there were discourses and think pieces people wrote about how instant locs and using loc extensions were cheating the loc process. What I did not understand was why these people failed to understand that people get locs for different reasons and that there are a variety of methods used to start them. If they were not meant to be used, they simply would not exist. I learned that these methods consisted of interlocking, coiling, two-strand and three-strand twists, crochet, matting, and freeform. My loc journey may have been a quick and easy one but it does not mean any less than if I had gotten twists, interlocked, or coiled my hair simply because the hair takes longer to lock and takes time to mature. It is a valid transition just like anyone’s. It is the best choice I have made for myself and I couldn’t be happier.