Haircut!

I thought one of the benefits of short hair, besides increased frequency of hair-washing, would be that the neighborhood girls would stop running dirty fingers through it and yanking it into braids/knots. No such luck. In fact, my hair now gets yanked harder and with more frequency because the braids come undone before they’re done. The girls enjoy the challenge.


Reactions to my haircut have been mixed. Fama either said I’m a bad person or that I spoiled my hair. She’s probably mad because now she can’t braid my hair for Tobaski. Rugi said, “Your hair is not beautiful. You are a man” and Cherno said I have men’s hair. Really, my hair’s not that short. Isatou Kumbel and Sinni both said something that may or may not have been a compliment but I didn’t quite hear either one and was afraid to ask for clarification. One girl, whose name I wish I could remember, loves my haircut and wants me to cut her hair in the same style.


Fatou Bobo asked, “Binta, you cut your hair?” Amadou asked, “Binta, you cut your head?” and I wondered, in a fairy-tale sort of way, about self-decapitation.