Tales of the Big Chop: Tiga from France

Tiga writes:

I was born and raised in France. When I was a kid my mom would press my hair with a hot comb, later I got a relaxer. However she would not relax my hair every 3 months, she would wait and braid my hair. When I was around 12 or something my mom went to a dermatologist who told her about the effect of relaxing hair since that day she stopped relaxing my hair and my little sister's hair as well as her hair. I would have braids most of the time. Everybody at my school loved it. My teacher would say, "oh Tiga is so pretty she always has a new haircut". So I never had issue with my hair. The only thing was that since my mum braided my hair I did not know how to care for my hair by myself. When I was 15 she fell sick and stayed at the hospital for a long time. I had nobody to do my hair so I had relaxer. The same year we moved to the West Indies as the doctor told my mum she need a warmer climate.

When I was living over there I saw people wearing their hair in all kind of different of ways, but mostly in its natural state. One day I told my mum cut it off. I was 16 when I went bald. My hair grew back and I loved it. I did color it in bright red because it was just the expression of my bubbly, explosive personality. I had my cousin to braid my hair as well as my sister. In 2005, I decided to an exchange program to improve my spoken English and I chose to go to New Orleans. In August, I left for the University of New Orleans. I had my hair braided in bright red I loved it. Unfortunately, Katrina struck New Orleans and I had to flee. Needless to say that my hair was my last worry. I had no contact with my family for a couple of days and all I had left was a suitcase with 3 pairs of underwear, 3 t-shirts 1 pair of jeans. We (my 2 friends and I) decided to stay in America to continue our exchange program and we went to University of Lafayette. I had the best and at the same traumatic experience. I had the best experience because I made a lot of friends, I discovered a lot of things and got used to different cultures —which was fun. However, it was also a traumatic experience.

Like I said with Katrina my hair was my last worry and I still had my bright red braids on but it was time for me to take them off. So I took them off and as I like color and colored again. I wanted a bright red but the hairdresser messed up my hair and it came up bright orange. She told me it would be $60. My hair was braided and I guess she didnt see that my hair was natural. As soon as she took off the braid everybody at the salon look at me customer and hairdresser alike. She asked me if I wanted a relaxer and I said no thanks I am fine I just want a color. I could see she was kinda reluctant but she did my hair anyway and like I said it was a mess. So when she was done with the color she said as you hair were hard to do given its natural state it will be $80 instead. Then she asked me if I wanted to have it style and dried for an extra, needless to say I left the salon with my hair dripping wet. My friend finished my hair at the dorm.

The next day I was feeling good and walking very confidently toward the cafeteria. As soon as I walk in everybody stopped talking I mean literally stopped talking and then there was a rumor and everybody was talking again. I wondered why people were staring at me I even went to the bathroom to see if something was wrong. When I went back to the caf, people were making comments when I was passing nearby them such as "Girl slavery is over. Do you know what a comb is, probably not she is from Europe I heard they don't have hairdresser over there". Girls were asking me if my hairdresser went to jail. "Poor girl she was in New Orleans probably forgot her comb over there". I was mortified.


Here I was in a foreign country with no family, feeling especially alone after Katrina and facing people making hard comments on my hair. Then when I looked around I realized that I was the only girl on the whole campus wearing my hair in its natural state. Every single black girl had their hair relaxed or braided.When talking with some black friends they were like it is normal, it's America people don't like to see natural hair. If you wear you hair natural it means you are making a statement of pride and they don't like that. To make matters worse I was dark-skinned. It was like a no no, dark-skinned and afro hair hell no. It was a pretty much stressing environment.

I had to hear the hard comments from black people as well as the stares. White people were looking at me as if I had a beard, most of the time they were just touching my hair like it was a public property. I had a white canadian friend and she was playing soccer, she had problem managing her hair so she would braid her hair. She was telling me that her teammates were calling her the N word because she had braids and it was considered a black hairstyle. She did not understand the big deal, being from Canada. She had friends from everywhere and it was not unusual for her to wear braids and nobody ever made comment about it. She told me that her coach told her to take them out beacause she was not a N word. She said no and he suspended her saying that her hairstyle was not appropriate for a soccer field.

So after a month or two I started being tired of hearing comments and I had my friend relax my hair. The next day I came to the caf everybody was like, "finally". My guy friend even told me, " As a matter of fact you are pretty". I noticed the difference almost immediately, I was not the different anymore. I was the cute french girl with the sexy accent. Funny how a simple hairstyle can change everything. My roommate then started weaving my hair. I would do it every 2 weeks and I would do a color every 2 months or so. My hair started falling out to the point I had a bald spot. I was mortified. I let people affect me and affect who I was. Besides I was taking classes on African history and I felt that I was deceiving myself with my hair, it was not me. One day at the caf I had two sisters coming to me and tell me, "You have inspired me to go natural". I was ashamed of myself because I had given up who I was to please others while others found the courage to wear their hair natural because of me. As my hair was still falling off I did a short haircut and decided that I was not going to relax my hair anymore in 2006. Believe it or not I still haven't done the big chop. My hair grew back and the relaxer fell off in the back of my head but in the very front the very end of my hair are still relaxed. I know it is crazy. At first wanted to transition until I reached a comfortable length it has been 4 years now. My hair is shoulder length and is completely natural except for the very front of my hair like I said. I think it is time for me to cut it of but each time I push it back, I am telling myself it fell of in the back so it will eventually fell of in the front too but no it is still there hanging on. I never trim my hair I wonder if it would prevent my hair to grow but actually no it is still growing so I guess one day maybe I will do the big chop.