Hair do's

So when I arrived in Burkina I had NO idea that the majority of the women's hair was fake. Yup, that's right. The beautiful braids and length are extensions. It was explained to me that because of the dryness and the heat year round, their hair is very dry and breaks easily. The funny part of this to me was when they would ask me if MY hair was all real. Just as I assumed (from being with people with mostly natural hair) that their hair was real, they assumed (from being with people with mostly fake hair) that my hair was fake.

I had seen the girls braiding each other's hair and doing simple stuff but never much of the extensions. The week before I left Burkina, I stayed with my friend Adiara (the orphanage social worker) and her mom in their courtyard. Adiara was going to visit her fiance the next day so she was re-doing her hair that night. I went with her to see how it works.
(all the choices of hair)
WOW was it interesting :) Of course took a ton of time...

The first step was taking out her old extensions- they are creative with what they have (and with the lack of money to afford other things) and use a razor blade to cut out the extension ends.

Then it's all combed out and product is put in.

From there it was braided tightly to Adiara's head using a few small extensions just to make it long enough to hold the braids together.

Adiara had chosen short straight hair with a bit of color in it so the hairdresser- starting at the base of her head- literally sewed with needle and black thread the extensions into Adiara's hair.
It was then cut and styled and walah! FINI!
Such a fun and definitely cultural experience :)