Hair Gel Predicament

The other day, I found myself in a bit of an embarrassing situation. I have one of those heads of hair that kinda resembles a porcupine, or as I’ve been told before, the infamous Chia pets. When you cut it, it’s like mowing your lawn, which similarly, needs to be kept short in order to secure a respectable appearance at all. I need to keep it cut every couple of weeks, but when my barber is 3 hours away in the capital city, sometimes things get a little shaggy. I’m at that point now (don’t you just love a missionary with such vain topics) where I should have cut my hair last week, but it doesn’t yet warrant a 6-hour voyage. The solution at this junction has always been hair gel. Now, this took me years to get comfortable using, but eventually the various…uh, NUMEROUS hair stylists in the states convinced me it was my saving grace. I’m not big on gelling the ol’ mop down unless it really needs it. Wednesday, it did…just a little. So I cleaned up, got dressed, and slicked down these porcupine locks and headed out to my discipleship lesson in the village of Dekpo (deek-poe). Now, without perpetuating the vanity too much, I do have to tell you that Africans think my hair is really cool. They always want to touch it, especially right after it’s been cut real short. I’ve had several of them say, “you’re not like other Americans, you have hair like us.” Compliment accepted, I rejoice not having really liked my hair much in America.

So we’re sitting there as the crowd gathers. Minutes turn into hours. The Aja people have a custom that you don’t talk much while others are still arriving…just sit in silence. This custom drives me nuts because it seems like we could spend this time doing more productive things (such an American I am). But I’ve learned over the years just to sit and stare like everyone else. Well, Wednesday I was looking around the room and noticed an elderly woman grinning and whispering to her younger lady friends…all the while staring at me! Not only a taboo to be talking, I wondered what she might be giggling about. I thought about the many times in the past, when upon inquiry, I’d find out that the people were sharing their fondness for my hair. So I leaned to my friend, Senou (see-new), and asked him what they were saying. Awaiting the typical friendly response toward this Chia pet head, I was shocked when Senou said, “they are saying that you have stuff in your hair like women use to make their hair look pretty.” I excused myself and ran behind the trees and scrubbed my head vigorously to get every ounce of gel out! Guess I won’t be doing that again….


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When we were first learning French, one of the most terrifying language experiences was having to go and get your hair cut. Not only are there so many specific terms to the coiffure world that we hadn’t learned yet, the main challenge was just getting the request out, “I would like to have my hair cut.” That is because the word in French for hair is “cheveux” (shuh-voo) and the word for HORSES is “chevaux" (shuh-vo). Imagine the embarrassment to walk in and announce your intention to “have your horses cut”!

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Out here in the bush of West Africa, there are lots of thoughts about life that don’t necessarily agree with science, or even traditional Western ideas of things. One gave me a chuckle last night as I was visiting about our friend, Ega, whose wife is due any day now. I was talking with Sossa, who works for us, as he was leaving, curious if he had heard any news on Lokadi (loh-kah-dee). He confirmed she had not yet had her baby. I responded that it could be any day now, but that we’ve thought that same thought every day for the past few weeks. Sossa, with complete seriousness said, “you know, sometimes people say it takes 9 months to have a baby, but Lokadi was telling everyone at church that with her other babies it was more like a year. God wants us to be patient and He’ll decide when it’s time.” I nodded and smiled (agreeing with the latter phrase only) and then went inside where Kelly and I got a big laugh!

- Rockin' Randall