I was intrigued by the hair of Namibian women...

I was just watching Bizarre Foods a few moments ago and Andrew Zimmern was visiting a village in Namibia. I was quite interested in their culture and learnt a lot of interesting facts. I was especially intrigued by their natural beauty. I was amazed at how flawless their hair was and was even more surprised at their hair care technique. The women have hair of a reddish color and it looks very much like locks, only wayyyy neater than most. I had to dig a little deeper into this culture to find out exactly how and why their hair appeared the way it did.

The secret to the color and neatness of their hair lies in an indigenous mixture of butter fat and ochre called otjize. This mixture is incorporated with mud. The women braided each others hair with hair extension made of plastic. The hair is then covered (except the ends) with the ochre mixture. The hairstyle of the women indicates age and social status. Married women for example, wore headdresses with many streams of braids, colored and put in shape with the otjize mixture. Children have two plaits of braided hair but once girls get to the age of puberty their braids are moved to the face over their eyes and they are now allowed to have more than two braids.

These women live in a somewhat primitive society but from my observation they seemed to be very conscious of their appearance and placed much effort into grooming especially their hair. I couldn't help but notice and envy them for how flawless their skin and complexion was. Might I mention that the same butter fat and ochre mixture is what they use on their skin... and we are here paying big bucks on skin care and we cant seem to get it right...LOL!!!! I think consistency is also key, as they apply this magic potion every morning religiously. In addition to this little piece of their culture that I learnt, I also found out that they are a very loving and friendly group of people and just watching the feature about them made me feel like they are my friends.....there are some great and interesting people in the world and I just thought I would share a little about them with you.....

Love, Peace and Natural Hair.