Ever lived in a country where textured hair care is minimal ???

C

coupe2

New Member
Hi Ladies,

I thought I would post/start a new thread for ladies who are living in countries where there particular hair care needs are not being met. by this I mean that ready access to products that can be bought easily in the UK or US (for example) for textured hair do not exist where you are currently living.

Secondly, where you have chosen not to import products or rely on family to send things to you, same for online stores, because of time it takes to send, expense of shipping and can be complicated.

This could equally apply to makeup such as tones shades of foundation, underwear (bras bigger than a C cup considered maternity wear) :spinning: shoes, etc.

What would/do you do?

OK, to start, I live in Hong Kong and have lived here for 3 years, LHCF has been a hairlife saver for me, Thank you :circle:
I am a natural head.

So: where are you living?
what do you do for your hair?
Are you natural or relaxed?

Come in, share the hair knowledge and other country life experiences !!!
 
I live in Finland. Natural. We have ethnic shops here but they are full of crap. The best I can get is Lekair Cholesterol, S curl moisturizer. They do carry also ORS line and some Motions products.
 
I live in germany where people still think you got to relaxer your whole head everytime and if not it breaks ....nuff said!
 
lipati said:
I live in Finland. Natural. We have ethnic shops here but they are full of crap. The best I can get is Lekair Cholesterol, S curl moisturizer. They do carry also ORS line and some Motions products.
Click to expand...


I am surprised Lipati, I always thought and was led to believe that Finland had a fairly sizable black population.

Ar you using any of the products you mentioned or alternatives ?
 
coupe2 said:
I am surprised Lipati, I always thought and was led to believe that Finland had a fairly sizable black population.

Ar you using any of the products you mentioned or alternatives ?
Click to expand...

The whole of Finland has about 15, 000 black people, 10, 000 somalis. Like I said the shop is full of staff like blue magic grease, pink lotion and the likes.
I deep condition my hair with Lekair cholesterol mixed with olive oil. Moisturize my hair with S curl and seal with coconut oil. I also use baking soda mixed with conditioner for cowashes or just plain conditioner. I dont use shampoo. Thats it. Lately I decided to find more quality and natural products, I want to try Qhemet biologics line and oyin handmade.
 
lipati said:
The whole of Finland has about 15, 000 black people, 10, 000 somalis. Like I said the shop is full of staff like blue magic grease, pink lotion and the likes.
I deep condition my hair with Lekair cholesterol mixed with olive oil. Moisturize my hair with S curl and seal with coconut oil. I also use baking soda mixed with conditioner for cowashes or just plain conditioner. I dont use shampoo. Thats it. Lately I decided to find more quality and natural products, I want to try Qhemet biologics line and oyin handmade.
Click to expand...


In HK it is posible to go for days without seeing another person who looks like me. :sad: I can get coconut oil but none of the other things mentioned. I am using mainly natural oils.

Methinks HK needs a curly revolution :grin:
 
I live in Belgium, relaxed, but I go back to the UK or US for all my hair care. I live in Liege, and there is a large Congolese community here...there are actually two stores that carry Avlon products (Affirm and Keracare), but they import their stuff from the US, too. I feel for you...I used to think I had it bad coming from the US to the UK!
 
Wow, I thought I had the worst situation. I guess I was wrong. There are several online stores but i am not willing to pay $ 50 for some 8 oz jar of hair cream.
 
Liege4421 said:
I live in Belgium, relaxed, but I go back to the UK or US for all my hair care. I live in Liege, and there is a large Congolese community here...there are actually two stores that carry Avlon products (Affirm and Keracare), but they import their stuff from the US, too. I feel for you...I used to think I had it bad coming from the US to the UK!
Click to expand...


Ahhh!!! missing London BBS.
 
I live in Sweden - born and raised here.

I don't rely too much on the products that are usually mentioned on this site...for me it's enough with moisturizing shampoo and conditioner + a simple hair cream and avocado butter.

I've learned to make do with little, and it has paid off :D

When I grew up I didn't even know what a relaxer was. In fact, I never saw a black woman in real life until I was around 8 or 9 years old. I had seen two black women on TV. That's all :lachen: So you know we were very isolated back then. I saw a black woman on a poster when I was 9 and I was so fascinated with her afro :love: I thought she was the most beautiful person I had ever seen. Most blacks here then were either African students (men) or their children.

Nowadays we have around 60 000 immigrants from Africa here, but there are also many blacks from South America, the Caribbean and the USA + all of the second generation blacks (like me) and the adopted blacks. I would estimate at least 100 000-150 000 people here of African descent.
 
FlowerHair said:
I live in Sweden - born and raised here.

I don't rely too much on the products that are usually mentioned on this site...for me it's enough with moisturizing shampoo and conditioner + a simple hair cream and avocado butter.

I've learned to make do with little, and it has paid off :D

When I grew up I didn't even know what a relaxer was. In fact, I never saw a black woman in real life until I was around 8 or 9 years old. I had seen two black women on TV. That's all :lachen: So you know we were very isolated back then. I saw a black woman on a poster when I was 9 and I was so fascinated with her afro :love: I thought she was the most beautiful person I had ever seen. Most blacks here then were either African students (men) or their children.

Nowadays we have around 60 000 immigrants from Africa here, but there are also many blacks from South America, the Caribbean and the USA + all of the second generation blacks (like me) and the adopted blacks. I would estimate at least 100 000-150 000 people here of African descent.
Click to expand...


FlowerHair you are one of my hair idols, :notworthy thanks for stopping by. I have learned to do with very little and to be honest my hair is thriving. I very occasionally (all the time - LOL ) suffer from product envy after viewing LHCF, it has had the positive effect though of making me very creative.

HK's black population ( the ones I have met) consists of expats from the US, UK, and the Caribbean, who typically are on emplyment contracts for usually initially 3 years. I am from the UK.

The African population are for the most part business people, traders and refugees.

I don't know the numbers, by sight alone we are few and far between.
 
I live in New York, but whenever I go to Trinidad, I don't see a lot of natural hair care products. There is an Origins at the Trincity mall, though.

There's a BSS store in the Trincity mall, but the mineral oil/petrolatum products are behind the register & you have to ask the sales associate for them. The products that are sold at discount stores were out in the open, though.

If anyone on here is from Trinidad or is familiar with Trinidad, where are the BSS with more natural products? Where are other BSS's? I have everything that I need, but I'd still like to browse.
 
So: where are you living? I live in Kobe, Japan. I relocated here 3.5yrs ago from Ohio.

what do you do for your hair? When I first moved here, I had a boycut. Decided to grow my hair out b/c I couldn't find anyone to cut my hair. I can go months w/out seeing another black person in my area. If it weren't for LHCF and BHM, I have no clue what I would have done with my hair. Through these forums, I learned about natural products and how to care for my hair. Unfortunately, I do have to rely on online sites for my stuff. Ethic products here are a rarity or brutally expensive. So iherb.com is definitely my lifeline...

Are you natural or relaxed? I'm natural
 
oooop2 said:
So: where are you living? I live in Kobe, Japan. I relocated here 3.5yrs ago from Ohio.

what do you do for your hair? When I first moved here, I had a boycut. Decided to grow my hair out b/c I couldn't find anyone to cut my hair. I can go months w/out seeing another black person in my area. If it weren't for LHCF and BHM, I have no clue what I would have done with my hair. Through these forums, I learned about natural products and how to care for my hair. Unfortunately, I do have to rely on online sites for my stuff. Ethic products here are a rarity or brutally expensive. So iherb.com is definitely my lifeline...

Are you natural or relaxed? I'm natural
Click to expand...

Hi oooop2, I live in Hong Kong.

My hair is natural and was natural when I moved here 3 years ago. For my hair I use natural products, oils, and lots of conditioner this is working for me. I actually found a shop recently that was selling shea butter at 350HKD for 500gms ( which is about 30UK pounds for just over 1 pound in weight ) way overpriced, so I'm still looking, thanks for the heads up on iherb.com will investigate.
 
hi coupe2,

Try ebay too. I got shea butter from ebay 1 pound for $ 20 including shipping. Actually shea butter was just $ 8 and $ 12 was shipping cost. Well it didn't work for my hair. I use it on my body. Next I'll try east african shea butter and avocado butter
 
lipati said:
hi coupe2,

Try ebay too. I got shea butter from ebay 1 pound for $ 20 including shipping. Actually shea butter was just $ 8 and $ 12 was shipping cost. Well it didn't work for my hair. I use it on my body. Next I'll try east african shea butter and avocado butter
Click to expand...

Thanks Lipati,
 
FlowerHair said:
I live in Sweden - born and raised here.

I don't rely too much on the products that are usually mentioned on this site...for me it's enough with moisturizing shampoo and conditioner + a simple hair cream and avocado butter.

I've learned to make do with little, and it has paid off :D

When I grew up I didn't even know what a relaxer was. In fact, I never saw a black woman in real life until I was around 8 or 9 years old. I had seen two black women on TV. That's all :lachen: So you know we were very isolated back then. I saw a black woman on a poster when I was 9 and I was so fascinated with her afro :love: I thought she was the most beautiful person I had ever seen. Most blacks here then were either African students (men) or their children.

Nowadays we have around 60 000 immigrants from Africa here, but there are also many blacks from South America, the Caribbean and the USA + all of the second generation blacks (like me) and the adopted blacks. I would estimate at least 100 000-150 000 people here of African descent.
Click to expand...


Your hair is beautiful...I love the color! I show your picture to my husband every day for inspiration :grin:

Shows that keeping it simple works wonders!
 
darlingdiva said:
I live in New York, but whenever I go to Trinidad, I don't see a lot of natural hair care products. There is an Origins at the Trincity mall, though.

There's a BSS store in the Trincity mall, but the mineral oil/petrolatum products are behind the register & you have to ask the sales associate for them. The products that are sold at discount stores were out in the open, though.

If anyone on here is from Trinidad or is familiar with Trinidad, where are the BSS with more natural products? Where are other BSS's? I have everything that I need, but I'd still like to browse.
Click to expand...

Pennywise is the main BSS. I think they have a pretty good selection. But maybe not if you are looking for all natural products. Though I have been able to get pure cocoa butter there, amla oil and a lot of the commercial products that they talk about on LHCF.
Other than that Super Pharm has a good selection, and its usually things you wouldnt see at Pennywise.
Recently my mom brought home pure shea butter that she found at some African and herbal stores in downtown POS. HTH
 
I grew up in northern New Brunswick( Canada) at the time( late 70's /early 80's ...i was born there) there were no black people there. We were among the first black families to move there. Back then, having cable meant having 12 channels...we rarely saw black people on tv.

There where no black salon and there is still no black salon to this day in my area. For the longest time mom and I were natural. We would wear our afros happy and all. We used head & shoulders for shampoo..really any shampoo did the job. Plus, for hair grease...we use Vaseline( petroleum). Worked a charm! Now back then, it was nearly impossible to find an Afro pick. We would go in store asking for some and everyone would look at us like :ohwell:. The city started to get some towards mid 80s.

We also tried to travel to Montreal as often as possible. We had to drive 40 minutes to get to the train station and then take a 13 to hours train ride to get to Montreal. That is where we would get our hair done and get the real deal hair products. We wore jherry curls for a while(1981-1984) and then we got our hair braided..its much easier.:yep:

Now even do I live at the capital, I still function on survival mode...I have my good hair products and my survival mode products for situation such as mentioned. I know what works and even if I don't have access to black hair care its ok.

If your hair is relaxed, gun for Vaseline intensive care lotion ( that will be your live in conditioner). Kerri lotion leaves a white film.Oils EVOO is the way to go but any oil will do. If you find Vaseline is too heavy, you can also go for Crisco shortning. vaseline ( petroleum) is good to sleek the hair down. Make sure to wear a scarf at night and all will be in place. Pre -poo with Vaseline( petroleum).

If you wear braids.... Vaseline petroleum is the way to go!! Kept my hair braided from the age of 7 to the age of 21. Vaseline petroleum kept my hair fine. On average I had my braids on for like 4 to 5 months. My hair was BSL. Nowadays, the mainstream hairlines products have leave in conditioner...so gun for the neutrogena triple moisture,Citrus line,Sunsilk, Dove... You will be fine.

Now if there is absolutely no neutrogena, etc line.... Try the mainstream hair lotions...Try it on your hair on a Friday night or Saturday...See if it leave a film/build up behind... if not you good to go. Other wise, try something else.
 
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coupe2 said:
Hi oooop2, I live in Hong Kong.

My hair is natural and was natural when I moved here 3 years ago. For my hair I use natural products, oils, and lots of conditioner this is working for me. I actually found a shop recently that was selling shea butter at 350HKD for 500gms ( which is about 30UK pounds for just over 1 pound in weight ) way overpriced, so I'm still looking, thanks for the heads up on iherb.com will investigate.
Click to expand...


OT: OMG...Love HK...Celebrated my 10yr wedding anniversary there..I ate so much Dim Sum...But think my favorite restaurant was Beirut...LOL

Also check out Nasabb.com for shea..I order from them. Love their quality..

iherb also sells Giovanni and Aubrey products...
 
Where are you living? I
'm living in Denmark, originally from the U.S.

What do you do for your hair?
Well the product selection here is not bad, as long as you aren't looking specifically for "ethnic" products. If you are looking for said products, they cost an arm and a leg. I was offended by some of the prices, when I thought of how much I used to pay back home. I order alot of stuff online from the UK (oils, shea butter, black soap) from www.sheabuttercottage.co.uk and my CON and Silicon Mix from www.afrohairsecrets.dk. Luckily my hair also likes Garnier and Schwarzkopf, which are plentiful here.

I tried the whole having people ship stuff to me from the States, but it's too much hassle really.

Are you natural or relaxed?
I am natural. One of the reasons I went natural is because I'm too cheap to pay 140 DKK (about $20-25 US) for a box perm and having folks mail them to me was getting a tad ridiculous. Finding a stylist here to do my hair while it was relaxed...:lachen:Shoot, finding someone to do my BC for me was impossible. Stylists here had no problem telling me they weren't going to do it or give me the third degree about why I wanted to cut off my hair. So natural was the way to go and I had a friend do my BC.
 
anherica said:
Where are you living? I
'm living in Denmark, originally from the U.S.

What do you do for your hair?
Well the product selection here is not bad, as long as you aren't looking specifically for "ethnic" products. If you are looking for said products, they cost an arm and a leg. I was offended by some of the prices, when I thought of how much I used to pay back home. I order alot of stuff online from the UK (oils, shea butter, black soap) from www.sheabuttercottage.co.uk and my CON and Silicon Mix from www.afrohairsecrets.dk. Luckily my hair also likes Garnier and Schwarzkopf, which are plentiful here.

I tried the whole having people ship stuff to me from the States, but it's too much hassle really.

Are you natural or relaxed?
I am natural. One of the reasons I went natural is because I'm too cheap to pay 140 DKK (about $20-25 US) for a box perm and having folks mail them to me was getting a tad ridiculous. Finding a stylist here to do my hair while it was relaxed...:lachen:Shoot, finding someone to do my BC for me was impossible. Stylists here had no problem telling me they weren't going to do it or give me the third degree about why I wanted to cut off my hair. So natural was the way to go and I had a friend do my BC.
Click to expand...

Yes, I almost had a heart attack the first time I went to BBS. The relaxer was 120NOK. I started buying things in large quantity here at home and taking it with me, when I am there. At one point I had a dream one night that I had turned my utility closet into a BSS there ... lol :lachen::nono:

Prices for AA hair products .... crazy. Another reason I started using Kerastase there ... just about the same price. I figured I might as well use something better. At the time, Schwarzkopf was not in the stores where I was there. However, some of the conditioners are better then a few of the Kerastase products.

Then, let's not even talk about the crazy taxes and other fee they charge when you order stuff from abroad. If you order over 200NOK, the fees start pouring down on you. Having it send as a gift is sometimes an option, but they are not very generous with the value limit.
 
So: where are you living? Right now i live in the U.S. where i have access to everything i want and need, But i grew up in Norway in a small town of 8.000 people so there were absolutely NO hairproducts for bi-racial hair. When i was very young my mother had to use petroleum jelly in my hair, that was the only type of grease she could find.
My childhood was much like Flowerhair's; my mother is black but I didn't see another black person in Norway till i was about 9 or 10 years old.
I remembered the first time i saw a bi-racial girl on TV and i was in total disbelief that there were someone out there that looked just like me..I must have been 12 at the time.

What do you do for your hair? Even when i got older finding products for my mixed hair was difficul because a lot of the products cointained harsh ingredients, still the products you find in Norway are pretty terrible, I would never use anything bought there in my hair, ecpecially products for black hair. There are a lot more black/mixed people in Norway but still not enough to even make up a precentage. I think the lack of knowledge also contributed to the terrible condition of my hair after I started to care for it. My hair was in excellent condition when mom was caring for it, even if we didn't have the "right" products.

Are you natural or relaxed? I am natural, i have always been natural, except for when i moved to the U.S. and decided to be like everyone else. I was relaxed for 4 months maybe..
 
lipati said:
I live in Finland. Natural. We have ethnic shops here but they are full of crap. The best I can get is Lekair Cholesterol, S curl moisturizer. They do carry also ORS line and some Motions products.
Click to expand...


How did you end up living in Finland? Were you born there?


coupe2 said:
I am surprised Lipati, I always thought and was led to believe that Finland had a fairly sizable black population.

Ar you using any of the products you mentioned or alternatives ?
Click to expand...

Finland is probably the whites place on earth..Even worse than Norway.
 
MissNorway said:
How did you end up living in Finland? Were you born there?




Finland is probably the whites place on earth..Even worse than Norway.
Click to expand...


I came as a student from Africa and end up living here.
You're right Finland is probably the whitest place on earth, I wonder where coupe2 heard about Finland having a sizable black population.
 
lipati said:
I came as a student from Africa and end up living here.
You're right Finland is probably the whitest place on earth, I wonder where coupe2 heard about Finland having a sizable black population.
Click to expand...

Lipati,

I was told this by an expat from Finland in Hong Kong. Maybe she was trying to impress me, :grin: because like you I thought it was the whitest place on earth.
 
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