Africa -- A New Twist On Life For Kenya Travelers

NAIROBI, Kenya - Ever since I saw Bo Derek in the movie "10," I wanted to try it.

Getting my hair braided, that is.

So when my traveling companion, Teri Sforza, suggested we get our hair coiffed Rasta-style in Nairobi, I thought it was a great idea.

The "no fuss, no muss" braids would be a perfect hairstyle for traveling. And what better place to try a radically new hairstyle than East Africa, where it was unlikely we'd bump into anyone we knew.

Besides, since the start of our backpacking trip through Africa and India, we'd tried, whenever possible to adopt local customs. We ate what the locals eat, wore what the locals wear, did what the locals do (unless it was something truly unpleasant like drinking cow's blood out of a gourd or carving champagne-cork sized holes into our ear lobes).

In Zanzibar, while we sat on a straw mat eating papaya, we had elaborate India ink tattoos painted on our shins, a traditional adornment on the Muslim island off the east coast of Africa.

Most of the women in the Kenyan capital of Nairobi, young and old, professional and not so professional, wear their hair in braids, or "suka" style. Getting our hair braided would be part of the cultural experience, we decided. And, of course, there was the Bo Derek thing.

Picking the place

It didn't take long to figure out that, like perms, there are good braids and bad braids.

When we'd see a woman on the street with a particularly nice set of tresses, we'd ask her where she'd had hers done. Most said they did them at home with friends.

We set out in search of a hair salon.

Finding a salon you like and trust is tricky enough in your hometown; we had no idea where to go in Nairobi. After wandering the noisy streets, we settled on Monique's Beauty Saloon, mostly because we liked the name.

Too much hair

The upstairs salon had a veranda overlooking the Nairobi City Market, a great place to buy folk art at half the price it sells for in the tony, air-conditioned galleries in town.

At the top of the dark narrow stairway, a woman in perfect, sweeping braids and a tight-fitting lime green dress was collecting hair in a dustpan.

"We want to get our hair braided like yours," we told her, once we established that she spoke English. "How much would it cost?"

"You want plaits," she asked, her eyes wide. She set down the dustpan and ran her fingers through our hair. "Eight-hundred shillings," she said, nodding slowly.

"Eight hundred shillings?" we exclaimed, in unison. It was only $12 at that day's exchange rate, but Teri and I were in the habit of shrieking whenever a price was first quoted to us in the Third World.

By the time we closed our mouths, the price had usually dropped by half. Not this time.

"You have a lot of hair," she said, almost sang, in her Swahili-accented voice.

We made appointments for 9 a.m. two days later. "It will take all day," the woman called out as we headed down the stairs.

We bought some food to snack on, not knowing how long we'd be at the salon. We hadn't been pampered in so long. This was going to be nice.

Three women wearing identically snug polyester green dresses were primping in front of a wall-length mirror when we arrived at the salon. The woman who had quoted the price to us, the only one in the bunch who spoke English, sat Teri down in her work area and directed the two other women to start working on my head.

The women whimpered when they saw how much hair fell out of my pony tail. My hair is thick. So thick, that the running joke when we were on safari in Kenay's Masai Mara game park was that there always was a lion in our midst.

The head stylist popped a funky gospel tape into a boom box and, after they had all approved of the musical selection, the stylists took a deep breath and got to work.

No pampering here

First, they sectioned off our scalps with clips so that our heads looked like California subdivisions. Each section had enough hair for about 30 braids.

They started the braids at the very root of the hair so that each crossover movement tugged painfully at the scalp. Teri and I made faces like the spider monkeys we'd just fed in the bush; the stylists rocked and sang.

Pampering this was not.

When they got to the bottom third of each braid, the stylists took a two-inch long synthetic hair extension and wove it into the braid, as a bonding agent, to keep the braid from separating. Of course, the mass-produced hair extensions came in only one color - dark brown - which didn't exactly blend with my red hair.

The women's hands moved as swiftly as a Vegas black jack dealers' hands. Once a braid was started, they could finish it off without looking.

They never stopped to rest or stretch their fingers; they didn't even stop for lunch. And when the tape ran out there was no replacing it - the stylists treated us to some of the best a capella harmonizing I've ever heard.

After six hours the head stylist finished Teri's braids and came to assist the other two stylists with the finale on my head, my bangs. By then, my head was throbbing; three pairs of hands tugging mercilessly on my forehead hair were pure torture.

High maintenance

We asked how long the braids would stay in.

"If you don't wash them, they will stay in two months," said the head stylist. "But you people are always washing your hair."

We paid, tipped and thanked the women then ran to our hotel, scalps tingling, to take some aspirin and count our braids. Teri had 150, I had more than 200.

The housekeeper at the Solace Hotel came to our room to tell us we looked "tough and sharp" with our new dos.

Teri was concerned that the hair extensions would not keep the braids from fraying so we spent a good portion of the next day knotting each braid.

Then, on the advice of a braided woman we'd met on the street, we spent several more hours massaging rich coconut oil into each braid, as a moisturizer.

Washing our hair took forever, braid by braid, very carefully.

So much for a no fuss, no muss hairstyle.

Where'd you get it?

For the rest of our stay in Kenya and until the braids came out in Europe, strangers bombarded us with questions. How long did it take? How much did it cost? Who's going to unbraid it?

Even the usually aggressive hawkers at the Nairobi city market would stop their sales pitch for a chance to run their fingers through our braids.

In our attempt to be chameleons, we were sticking out more than tourists in their white socks and sandals, with cameras and money pouches tangled around their necks.

Now for some beads

One afternoon, I was walking back to the hotel after purchasing a Masai spear when a man hanging out of a passing matatu (bus) shouted: "Hey Rasta Masai lady, where are you going?"

It was time to take the braids out, I told Teri. She talked me into adding beads to them instead.

At a five-and-dime store, we bought several bags of blue and black beads and Teri started putting them in my hair to kill time while waiting at the Nairobi airport for our Balkan Air flight to Athens.

A businessman from Bulgaria leaned over us, watching intently.

"This is art and you are an artist," he told Teri, setting down his briefcase for a closer look. Later, during the flight, the pilot invited us into the cockpit, he said, because he wanted to examine our heads.

In Athens' Plaka district, we had bottles of wine sent to our table by other patrons (not just men) who wanted an excuse to ask us about our hair.

But after about two weeks, new-growth hairs began sprouting, sticking straight out of our exposed scalps like weeds in a flower bed.

The beads were starting to fall out, and, more than once, I had to pick one out of my moussaka.

`Basta' with the Rasta

Teri broke down first.

Three weeks after our heady day at Monique's, she stayed up all night in a tiny hostel bathroom on the Greek island of Santorini, first cutting her hair extensions off with my Swiss Army Knife, then undoing the knots, removing the beads, and finally, unbraiding, strand by strand.

By morning, only about a third of her braids were out.

We went to visit an archeological dig to give her hands a break. When we missed the bus back into town, we straddled a wall and went back to work on her hair.

A couple from the United Kingdom on holiday kept staring, none too discreetly. When we explained the situation, they offered to help.

"I can't believe I'm doing this," said the 60-something Scot, as he undid a stubborn knot with his teeth. "No one will believe this back home." We took pictures for proof.

We unbraided my hair on the overnight ferry from Patras, Greece to Brindisi, Italy, in the middle of the dancing lounge surrounded by Italian couples who occasionally danced in our direction to monitor our progress.

For days after our braids were gone, huge clumps of hair would continue to fall out, we're still not sure why.

It felt good to have our old heads back, even if it meant making fewer friends on the rest of our trip. Pascale Le Draoulec is a freelance writer from San Diego.