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Text File | 1999-03-03 | 16KB | 179 lines

ALOE, HIBISCUS aka CONCHO NEEDLE and COCONUTMILK:

       In the West Indies everyone washes their hair with a cactus (!) called Aloe Vera or to a lesser extent
       with another cactus called hibiscus (there seems to be some other plant or family of plants also called
       hibiscus I think) but is colloquially called concho needle. Aloe is well-known for its healing effects on
       just about anything. It can for instance be used as a sunscreen (and even eaten) but also for
       hairwashing. To my knowledge it behaves just like normal shampoo but it's also supposed to be good
       for the skin and scalp. In addition it's a lot more "natural" than shampoo, in fact Aloe is very often an
       ingredient in shampoos - check the back of your shampoo bottle. Perhaps one out of five shampoos
       contain Aloe. I ought to explain just how you can wash your hair with a cactus. You take a "leaf"
       (you'll know when you see one), open it or cut it in half and then get a knife and scrape the
       semi-transparent gel you will find inside the shell. Have a cup or a can to cellect the jelly-like liquid you
       will get by scraping the "slime". It'll take a moment to do it but it's quite good fun. When you are done
       you pour it like shampoo over your hair. Then you shake and shake it out (do this on the beach and not
       in the shower because it "squirts") really well so that it spreads all over the hair and then just rinse like
       you're used to. The aloe plant can't be small when you harvest it, something like an armlength (well
       maybe not) for the leaf/piece your cut off. Aloe grows wildly in areas like the West Indies or but it's
       hard to know where to find it in a cold northern country (it'll take you five years to grow one from
       scratch in your kitchen window). Not long ago I discovered that pure Aloe "juice" is sold at my local
       health food store. If you find such a bottle, containing only pure Aloe liquid, then I have no reason to
       believe that there's any difference between that and self-harvested Aloe. Hibiscus is a flatter kind of
       cactus that you also take a piece of and cut it in two, then carve out the slimy-juicy inside into a bucket.
       The effect of hibiscus is like aloe or worse and it doesn't have the other healing effects as far as I
       know. A book I recently read claimed that some plants (when used in washing) give rise to a protective
       layer around the hairs - not too different from the natural oily layer the scalp emits. Aloe and
       Coconutmilk were listed among these and I conclude therefore that these are negative to locksforming
       in this particular sense.


                                  Artist Fred Locks is a natural one.

       HAIRDRESSERS:

       Some hairdressers claim they can "make" dreadlocks. It's usually about the comb method and maybe
       waxe also, occasionally even braiding. Another favourite is perms and some add to that (can be
       anything from waxe to braiding). They're not at all doing a bad job but be sure they'll charge you for it.
       It adds up as we're talking figures like six hours (in Sweden they'd charge 30 dollars an hour, but I
       doubt it's that expensive in other countries) and since it's _going_ to break up (more or less) and you
       have to fix a little yourself. Remember this is meant to be a rough guide so be sure that there are
       exceptions among the hairdressers of the world. An American company with a Dutch branch, called
       Hair Police, specialize in dread perms and extensions. They know what their doing but won't share any
       business secrets with me. Check their site if you are interested: Hair Police.

       WOOL SWEATER RUBBING:

       A guy called Huey has a method not to be forgotten. It is best explained on his own page: Huey's
       dreads method.

       COMMON PROBLEMS:

       If you've for instance have run the comb run or crochet or in some other way (braids) divided the hair
       up in sections and decided that a certain square or area is to become a dreadlock, it's not the way the
       hair feels. Dreadlocks has to sort of "fit in" with the whirls of your hair if its continuing growth is
       going to be round and nice. You can expect to get something that resembles "flaps" down the bottom of
       the locks, which are not neat-looking. This will fix itself in time, the dreader your hair gets, but it can
       take time depending on how serious the case is. Sometimes even years until it's completely troubleless.
       This may well mean you can get 10 - 20 cm (1 inch = 2.54 cm) segment that absolutely don't look like
       round symmetric locks you see on mtv, and on almost all the locks of your head. But then, if lucky,
       you'll hardly notice it at all. To fix the flaps a crochet is actually great, all you do is a small operation,
       grab the flap with the crochet and entangle it the way you want it to look. It works wonders, but don't
       do more work than necessary with the crochet because then the root of the problem is not solved, you
       just take care of the symptoms. Even in the old honest quit-combing method these "flaps" may show up
       but only in the beginning and to a much lesser extent. The flaps fix themselves as time goes by, but you
       never know when, it can take a long long time depending on how dread your hair is. Don't get the idea
       of making a knot at the bottom, hiding the problem. It's just a short term solution. One knot might not
       decide stay and you have to add another. The loss in length is compensated by an embarrassing
       "clump", being visible (not from far though) once the knot is lifted from the scalp. If you undo the knot
       your lock will look like a pig's tail where the knot once was. Since we've said a hair dies after 5-7
       years och is replaced by a new fresh hair popping up on a random spot of the scalp. If you have locks
       the probability of the hair popping up "inside" an already existing lock and will then join on to that
       lock. But sometimes the new hair must pop up right between two locks and then becomes a lonely and
       often curly hair. You drop 50 - 100 hairs a day so consequently 50 - 100 new ones appear so in only a
       month you have a whole bunch of these lonely hairs. People will say "they're beginning to break up
       and turn loose up there, ey?" (this is not the case but people don't know better). It raises the question
       what to do about them. Cut them away ? Well, then you'll get rid of them that's true but think of the
       long run - in a couple of years it'll be kind of thin as you get fewer and fewer hairs on your head. Well
       what happens to them ? 1. They join on to the nearest lock. 2. Enough lonely hairs find themselves
       close enough to each other and form a new (thin) lock. This is reason that there are locks of varying
       length and size in a hair with a couple of years passed. The varying length is not because something has
       been broken or cut off. With coloured people (very curly) these lonely hairs disappear so quickly that
       you never knew they were there. With other people with straight hair there can be "ownerless hairs" of
       shoulder length before they find their way in life. The older dreadlocks you have the faster these hairs
       will join or form a lock of their own.


       The hair (more or less - depending on heritage etc) gets thinner as one gets older. This kind of loss is of
                   course nothing that dreadlocks can prevent. Here are some old rastamen.


                                         Two thick ones.

       THICK AND THIN LOCKS:

       How do you get thin and how do you get thick locks ? In the West Indies the fashion right now is to
       have very thin locks or no locks at all. In the seventies (for instance in the era of Bob Marley) the
       fashion was thick locks. Thick locks are called bongolocks and their bearer bongoman. After some time
       with the locks on your head you'll notice that two locks close to each other grow and join on to each at
       the bottom (and in time they gradually merge fully). Very often so called lonely hairs function as
       bridges or links between two locks that then unite. It happens now and then, to prevent it simply firmly
       grab the two locks in question and tear them apart if you don't want big ones. Very often it's after a
       hairwash that you can notice two united locks (of course somtimes it's more than two) and one quickly
       developes the habit of checking with your hands. If you wait too long with the pulling apart the day
       comes when it has become impossible to pull them apart, then you can forget it. It is of course
       _possible_ (anything is possible) to cut them apart with a pair of scissors but it's absolutely nothing I
       recommend and is very risky. First it will look like splinters are coming out of there. Secondly the hairs
       aren't laying straight in one direction as it may look, hairs are stuck across and in every possible
       direction so after just a few vertical cuts with the scissors it all hangs in just a few hairs = catastrophy.
       Everyone starts out with thin locks and some end up with thick and some with thin. It's not seldom that
       it all ends up in just only big clump in old days. When the hair is 5-7 years old it falls off we said but
       still hang in there when dreadlocked. This isn't completely true to a 100%, if you have thin locks it
       could happen that a tuft of "dead" hair slides off (after many years) or that you can notice a thinner
       segment, but this never happens in the case of a thick dreadlock. And also, washing or rinsing with
       water will bring out single "dead" hairs that wouldn't have fallen off so easily otherwise. Occasionally
       (it's rare though) you can find pictures with huge towers standing straight up. Hair grows straight up
       so it's "only" the laws of physics that makes them fall and lean one or the other way - at a certain
       length/bottom area ratio. So towers only arise when, at the same time, all locks of a big area ontop of
       your head decide to unite. Because of the great bottom size the lock will be able to stand straight up.
       Imagine the diffence in being able to stand up on a flat desk, between a pencil and a bottle. Also
       imagine their both made of dreadlock and not any harder material. Dreadlock is of course not at soft as
       wool, perhaps like etremely compressed wool. Since the area of the head is limited it's not possible to
       cultivate a tower of infinite length - one day it's going to drop like Santa Claus's red top hat. The great
       overuse of a hat or a tam can help giving rise to a tower but only in the sense that the hat doesn't do
       anything compared to having it dangling freely. What I mean is that if you don't wear them in a hat they
       won't stay in the same fixed position but move around every time your turn your head around. I.e
       wearing a hat doesn't necessarily imply a bongolock, and not wearing a hat doesn't necessarily mean
       you'll avoid a bongolock. Only if you have the prerequisites for a bongolock you'll have one whether
       or not you wear a hat. The tam or hat though can help a bongolock that's already bound to be. Not just
       for bongolocks but for dreadlocks in general it's not easy to say whether a hat of some sort is negative
       or positive. It has to do with how you would have worn your hair otherwise. If your hair is exposed to
       a lot sunlight without a hat, then wearing a hat is negative in the sense that it covers the hair from
       sunlight (sunlight being tearing, note it especially when bathing in salt water). A hat is positive in the
       sense that it does not let the hair move freely, but so is a ponytail-style. And so on I am bound to this
       theoretical reasoning since in practise it's impossible to tell what was caused by the hat and what was
       caused by something else. But in short: A hat does a little good if and only if the circumstances are
       right.


                            Certainly a very odd formation. Possibly been cut.

       DANDRUF, MOULD, COWSHIT, ROTTENING, GLUE, LICE AND OTHER MYTHS:

       It's not uncommon for the scalp to become irritated too and you get dandruf. It's easy to get rid of, mix
       one tenth of apple cider vinegar when you wash your hair and it works without any problems. You
       won't even smell sour vinegar but you shouldn't wash it with vinegar more than once a week (that is
       even more than sufficient for the dandruf to go).

       Some rumours are about cowshit appliance to obtain dreadlocks are floating around. It's an urban
       legend of course but there is one origin. Women of some East Africn tribes (one of them being Masai I
       think) use moderate amounts of cowpat and other substances in their hair since it is considered
       attracting. I repeat they are not applying it in order to cultivate locks but since it's attracting whether
       they have locks or not. Occasionally you also hear about glue and people who have tried it in
       desperation. The whole idea is stupid and I haven't heard of a single succesful example.

       Moulding and rottening stories are heard occasionally, I'm not sure how this is supposed to happen. In
       such a case it has to be warm enough, moist and bad or no air circulation so if you want to be truly sure
       don't go to bed with wet hair. If you get lice you're in trouble. Louseshampoo kills the lice and their
       eggs, but the eggs remain attached to the hairs and need to be removed with a licecomb which is totally
       impossible. The eggs are dead so there won't be any births of new lice after the louseshampoo but it's
       not very clean and fresh to walk around like that. But it's something you have to live with. The only
       other alternative is indeed a haircut.

       Often you hear that it's gross and dirty with dreadlocks and some story about how green slime drips
       out of them if you cut and squeeze them. Dreadlocks do not have to be dirty, usually the hair is not as
       "clean" as normal hair but as said it's not _necessarily_ that way.

       I've met several people who think they invented dreadlocks, know just what to do, have magical hints
       etc. Really they're not liars - they believe what they say but haven't really done any serious research.
       It's usually a case of post hoc ergo propter hoc conclusions (B came after A, therefore B is because of
       A - not necessarily true) or heavy inductive speculations. Like person X did A and then B happened
       therefore all persons under all circumstances can do A and B will follow, without any doubt
       whatsoever. This is the reason you've probably heard something being in conflict with what's in this
       guide (Note: By this I'm absolutely not saying I can't be wrong he he. I am not God, this is only my
       hobby).

       Equip yourself with a good answer to the question "Why do you wear locks?", because you'll hear it
       many times. The ancient and original reason people had for wearing locks are indeed pretty much
       deeper than for instance that it's cool or different. So to speak, you carry a responsability, you might
       put everyone with dreadlocks to shame if you make a fool out of yourself (this is how it is, not how I
       desire it to be). As an example I can mention that a hell of a lot of people associate with cannabis.