Kingston Time!
View outside of my balcony
Hello ALL! After having moved away from New York City and my wonderful consultant Kelli Brown Daniels, a couple of months ago, I must say that I am not crying as much as I used to earlier. Ha! I am not crying at all! I AM ON A BEAUTIFUL ISLAND! Like, HEL-LO!!! Yes, I am now officially settled into Kingston, Jamaica. I am loving the locals and they are loving me right back…
And the best thing, is that so many people are loc’d here that my head hurts from snapping around to see the loc’d brother or sister who just walked by me with the gorgeous locs. I have seen every type of locs possible-from the big knotty locs of those people coming from the hills-the Rastafarians (nuff respect) to the smallest sisterlocks I have ever seen. The locs run the gamut. And they are all beautiful. I thought that moving to Kingston would lessen my attention to my siserlocks. If anything, the move has increased it. I am constantly in the mirror or my hands are in my hair trying to keep up with the Joneses and the Johnsons here. The locs are looking FABULOUS!!! The feeling about them are so different from what I remember growing up. I grew up around Jamaicans and only one of those families have locs. In fact, the closest Jamaicans to my family talked so eloquently about why locs were not seen as very beautiful and were worn only by those outsiders called Rastafarians.
Kingston outside my window
And in talking to older Jamaicans in Kingston, there was a time when that was true. You could not get a job if you had locs-no matter how small they were at the time. They told me stories of how Jamaicans from “good families” would never get locs or allow anyone in their families to grow them. Well, times are different. Oh, boy are they different. Does not mean that some of these sentiments that the older Jamaicans were talking about do not still linger with in certain families, but from what I see, locs are more appreciated. Kingston, generally, speaking is full of locs. I would have taken pictures of people and their locs but I respect the privacy of all. And I do not hide behind trees or structures trying to take candid pictures of people. That is quite uncouth. I never quite understand why complete strangers come up to me and ask to take pictures of me because of my hair but nonetheless, I still get a kick out of it. I know that bothers people but I can tell you that nothing like that happens in Kingston.
As for me, I am happy with my sisterlocks and will continue to sport them all over this wonderful city. I have found a sisterlocks consultant and she has been doing a great job with my hair. It feels great knowing that I am in good hands even though I left those of Kelli’s. Until next time, people, stay positive and take care!
Cheers,
Adaeze
