One of the greatest discoveries of my teenage years was realizing that hair could actually be personal. Until then, hair had always felt administrative – even if I didn’t have this word for it then. It was just a burden because we had no authority over it. It belonged to parents, schools, and rules. Hair was not something you expressed yourself with. Hair was something adults discussed over your head while you sat quietly waiting for your turn on a barber’s chair covered in cracked black leather or worn out cushion that had seen better days.
By the time my father started taking me to the barber shop, there was one rule that remained absolutely non-negotiable: no cuts. No sharp hairlines. No inverted machine trying to create those clean geometric edges around the forehead. Nothing fancy. Just a simple shave and we move on with life. My father had his reasons, and African fathers of that generation rarely paused to submit explanations for review. You simply obeyed and continued breathing peacefully.
So throughout most of primary school, my relationship with hair remained uncomplicated. Hair would grow. Hair would be removed. End of story. Then high school happened. And suddenly hair became political.
Now for those unfamiliar with Kenyan boarding schools, understand this carefully: in many schools, hairstyles were not merely hairstyles. They were resistance movements. Institutions spent years trying to convince boys that individuality was dangerous while teenagers spent equal energy trying to prove the opposite using outfits, slang, and of course, hair. For the ladies it was worse. You’ve probably heard of those girls schools where they forced young girls to cut their hair if they failed exams… To make matters worse… these were the “church” sponsored girls schools around the country. Coming to think about it, I see why Jesus had to die, otherwise… heaven wouldn’t be seen by some.
Somewhere between Form One and Form Four, I discovered that I genuinely loved long hair. Not rebellious-long. Not rockstar-long. Just enough to grow and maintain a proper afro. And once I discovered that truth about myself, I committed fully. A short jovial cheeky boy whose head spoke louder than the rest of him. I reduced my shaving frequency to almost ceremonial levels & up an Afro came.
The way I would report to school in January was almost exactly how I would return home at the end of the second term. The second term. It started off small… one term, I came back after midterm without shaving, then the next term I came with the previous term’s plus holiday’s hair… before we knew it… I had the longest hair in high school at some point. Barbers practically lost my business for four straight years. While other boys viewed haircuts as routine maintenance, I treated mine like the preservation of a national heritage site.
The afro slowly became part of my identity. And with great hair came great responsibility. I slowly entered the sacred world of hair maintenance; hair pomades, hair food, mirrors, comb collections, and that deeply personal relationship between an African man and a trusted afro comb. I became serious about my hair. Extremely serious. I learned the art of “compressing” the afro, where during the week I could look disciplined, neat, and academically responsible, but by the weekend, especially when buses from the bourgeoisie girls’ schools started arriving for concerts, sports, choir practice, and all those mysterious inter-school functions that suddenly made boys care about appearance, the hair would rise again to its full glory.
By Friday evening, the afro would already be negotiating its freedom. A little water here, a little pomade there, some careful combing, and suddenly I was no longer looking like an innocent student whose dream was to fly. The hair would expand with ambition. I even perfected the art of creating temporary rows from the same hair. By the last hour of Saturday preps, entire architectural projects were taking place on my head. I would create what can only be described as “budget dreadlocks,” tiny mock baby-locks irregularly arranged with the confidence of a man who had absolutely no professional training just hair under the mercy of idle hands and fingers.
By movie time during the evening, my goodness! I looked like I belonged somewhere in the cast of an early 2000s music video. At least in my own mind. Jesus knows I treasured that hair.
There was one legendary product in particular called Dax. Plastic container with dark green content. Heavy. Powerful. If you know it, you know it. For some reason all hair food is green. My current tub included. This one from Venus. One container could last nearly an entire school term. During shopping days, while other students prioritized biscuits and entertainment, I was calculating long-term hair sustainability. Shall I hint at this point that these particular hair rituals were not amusing to some of the guys & this actually got me on the top list of suspects of those who were “playing for the other team.” But let’s focus on the hair. We will be writing on the other things later.
Now unfortunately, maintaining an afro also introduced me to one of the great betrayals of genetics: brown hair. Under the Witeithie sun, my hair refused to cooperate. It couldn’t stay perfectly black. It carried those brownish shades that made it look permanently sun-tested. Of course, people suggested dyeing it, but we had received enough cautionary tales to terrify us all. We were told if you started dyeing your hair too early, your future included premature grey hair, suffering, and possibly disappointment in life generally. So I accepted my fate and kept my brown-tinted afro with dignity.
And caring for an afro in a boarding school was not a casual activity. It was a discipline. You had to understand moisture. Timing. Texture. Strategy. An afro could humble a man very quickly if approached carelessly. If you failed to comb it while slightly wet, you were finished. Completely finished. The comb would stop midway like it had encountered the Prince of Persia who was struggling with the Angel holding the response to Daniel’s prayers. So I learned the rituals, early. Water first. Patience second. Comb afterward.
Mang’u itself added another layer of difficulty because that place could become unbelievably hot during certain seasons. Lunchtime often felt like surviving inside a frying pan with academic ambitions. So I developed another survival tactic: during especially hot afternoons, I would pour water into my hair, comb it lightly, then intentionally leave some moisture trapped inside the afro. For the next couple of hours, my head became its own personal air-conditioning system. Innovation.
Looking back now, I realize those years were never just about hair. They were about identity. About discovering preference. About slowly becoming comfortable with myself. For the first time in my life, my appearance was no longer being entirely decided for me. I was beginning to choose. And honestly, I loved that afro.
For years after high school, I kept it. The relationship lasted longer than many modern relationships. Me and that hair had history. But eventually, life introduced me to the military. And the military, unfortunately, does not negotiate with afros.
After years of carefully maintaining my hair, protecting it, moisturizing it, and treating it like a personal legacy project, I would soon encounter military barbers whose understanding of hairstyle could be summarized in one sentence: “Remove everything.”
That, however, is another story entirely.