Aug. 17 (UPI) — The Florida woman who holds the Guinness World Record for longest locks said her tendrils of hair have now reached a length of 110 feet.
Asha Mandela, 60, was first awarded the record for longest locks (locs) in 2009, when her locks were measured at 19 feet and 6.5 inches, and the record-holder said her hair has now reached a length of 110 feet.
Mandela, who lives in Clermont, said she first started growing her locks when she moved to the United States from Trinidad and Tobago more than 40 years ago.
“I don’t like the term dreadlocks because I don’t think there’s anything dread about my locks,” Mandela told Guinness World Records. “I refer to my own hair as my royal crown of locs or my cobra.”
Mandela said she usually carries her hair around in a cloth sling to prevent her locks from dragging on the ground or straining her neck.
“When I’m ready to go into my sleep chamber with my cobra baby, I would have them tied up in a little sack and we cuddle and talk to each other,” she said.
Mandela’s husband, Emmanuel Chege, a professional lock stylist from Nairobi, Kenya, spends hours each week on maintaining Mandela’s hair.
Chege washes Mandela’s hair once a week, an occasion that calls for up to six bottles of shampoo and ends with a two-day process of drying.
Mandela said she plans to continue growing her locks.
“I will never see or feel that there’s a time I would want to cut my hair. It’s never going to happen,” she said.
