If there is one thing 20-year-old Gabrielle Ohaya is passionate about and knows how to do well, it is making hair. After having low cut hair for about six months, Ohaya, Wednesday, was sporting her new braided hair-do. Born to Nigerian parents, Ohaya, a junior communications studies student from Montbello, CO., is now putting her hair making skills to great effect by using her proceeds, along with student loans, to pay her tuition fees.
“At this point, I’m the oldest of four. So I mean there is a whole bunch of people being paid for, and my parents also pay the tuition of my cousins back in Nigeria,” she said.
Her (Ohaya) tuition fees cost on average $12,000 each year. She charges $15 to $100 depending on the type of hair-do.
Ohaya said she grew the desire to start making hair when she was young and would watch her mom spend money to have her (Gabrielle) and her sister’s hair made.
“I noticed there were a lot of times that I would get hairstyles that I didn’t like, and I would want to fix it. So when I was about 8 or 9 years old, I started paying close attention to the people doing my hair and my sister’s,” she said. “I started practicing and learnt how to do it.”
Sophomore biology student, Isi Eichie, 20, has known Ohaya all her life. Eichie said they have been close friends since they were 1-year-old and met when both their parents enrolled them in the same day-care.
“If I could describe Gabbi’s attitude in one word, I would say ambitious,” Eichie said. “She does whatever she can to make it happen.”
Growing up, the relationship between Ohaya and her parents was tense. Ohaya said she made the Montbello Park-N-Ride bus stop a home away from home.
“I hated going home; I hated being in my parents’ house. It was like my escape, and it was down the street from my parents’ house,” she said.
After having dropped out of high school for two months in her senior year, Ohaya’s freshman year at Colorado State University, CSU, did not start off as well as she hoped. This gave her the motivation to remain at CSU.
Danielle McConnell, 20, said Ohaya had created in herself a very strong sense and the ability to stand as a strong woman.
“I have known Gabbi since freshman year of high school. She finds her own ways to manage her lifestyle,” McConnell said. “She has picked up things that she is good at outside of her education and worked with them.”
There is a new trend among girls and women in the hair industry these days: feather hair extensions. Ohaya does not see the fascination in this trend.
“I think it is stupid. I do not see why anyone would want feathers in their hair,” she said.
I think this is an interesting idea for a story; I've always wondered about braiding and deardlocks. Which is why I wish this article had included more of that. A separate breakout box on how she braids, how long it takes, and what she uses (extensions? or does she braid real hair?) would have really helped this story.
ReplyDeleteI also feel like we didn't get too much sense of who she is as a person--what does she want to do with her degree? what did she do at the Montbello bus stop--did she have friends there? And why did she drop out of high school for two months? Is she in a better place mentally now? I just had a lot of questions as a reader.
Very creative idea for a feature for sure! Proof that there are stories among everyday people we meet.
ReplyDeleteI'm going to have to agree with Aliese... Breakout boxes with some interesting information would have helped the story a ton. And background info is key to a feature, otherwise we are kinda left to guess, so make sure you put as much info about the person as possible.
I enjoyed the story very much and I think the subject was extremely interesting. I will agree with the above comments as far as content goes. I feel like her story could be an entire section in a magazine and I was left with a lot of questions. It left me wanting to know more which is good because you got my attention as a reader for sure! I would just capitalize on that. Nice work!
ReplyDeleteI think this idea was a good thought for a feature story, but I think you could have focused it more on how she does hair and why she does it. There were also some punctuation mistakes that were slightly distracting,and the ending quote threw me off a little bit. But I thought it was an interesting topic.
ReplyDelete