Diary of an Honest Naturalista: Week 115

So I decided one day last week that my hair was not black enough, and I needed to get it blacker. I then decided to buy Indigo powder and use on my hair. The rave is that if you use indigo with Henna, you would get a black colour, but if you use it alone, you would get a blue black colour. I pictured myself strutting around the company like Yemisi in her red hair chameleon hair with blue black. Who wants the regular black, when we can get blue black? The HR manager would definitely know there was something amiss with my look, but won’t be able to pinpoint seeing that it is hard for the unlearned eyes to know the difference between black and blue black.

I therefore decided to go for the second option, and skip the henna. Immediately I soaked the indigo, I witness for the first time, a scientific reaction I had never seen in my life. The water was below, while the mass of powder floated. No amount of stirring with spoon could change the status quo. At the end of the day, I had to use my hand to do the mixing. Thankfully, my palms were protected with gloves.

After mixing, I started applying the mix on my hair. Immediately, I knew it was a mistake not to have mixed it up with henna. I realised that just like hibiscus, indigo powder doesn’t clump or stick to hair like other powders. It was then it occurred to me, the real reason why people mix it with henna. Some of the mixture kept falling on the ground, from my hair. Thankfully, I had protected my floor with newspaper, so I had no concerns about staining.

After a couple of minutes, I was successfully able to cover my hair with the indigo mix, and quickly protected the integrity with plastic cap. I washed off after one hour, and then looked at my hair.

No change!

No blue black! Not even black!

My dreams and fantasies of impressing Yemisi and oppressing the HR manager shattered immediately. I was crestfallen. I eventually packed what was left of my hair dignity and moved on. I didn’t want to me a sore loser, or whine to Dimeji… again.

Two days later, Dimeji saw me, and made a comment.

“Anna, what did you do to your hair?”

“My hair?” I looked confused. “Nothing. Is anything wrong with it?”

“No.” he was intensely staring at my hair. “It is just that it… seems… a little bit darker than usual.”
I could tell from the way he was looking that he himself wasn’t sure. “Really? Wow. Hmm… so the indigo worked.” I looked in the mirror to confirm Dimeji’s observations. It was indeed a bit darker than usual.

“Indigo? I thought you said you didn’t do anything?”

“I used indigo powder, but I didn’t think there was any change in my hair.”

“Indigo? Well, maybe it oxidises after a while, if there was no immediate change, and now there is a change.”

“Oxidise?” I looked in askance.

Source

I immediately brought out my phone and did more searches on google. I saw that the colour change in hair after the use of indigo occurs over a period of days, and not immediate, because it needs to exposed for oxidation, or something like that.

This hair matter is really making me a science expert.

Will I be doing the indigo thing again? Most likely, but I would definitely be doing it with henna. After all, I never got my dream blue black colour. So what’s the fuss about?

Did you enjoy or learn from the article above? Please, like our Facebook page here. Thank you