Shampoo Bars « « From Here and There From Here and There

Over the last few years, I have noticed people leaning more towards healthier life styles. Maybe it is because of the choices I have made to live a healthier life that I am seeing people around me choosing healthier approach in life, whether it is the food they eat or the products they use it is good to see. In this article I would like to talk a little about shampoo/soap bars for hair. Shampoo bars have been around for a while. Before liquid shampoo became popular people everywhere used shampoo bars to clean hair. Did you know that the word shampoo is derived from the Indian word chāmpo in 1762 which meant massage of hair with some kind of oil? This was later introduced to Britain by a Bengali entrepreneur named Dean Mahomed. Later this went beyond just massaging hair with oil and changed to using soap bars to clean hair. In the early stages of shampoo, hair stylists started using shaved soap pieced in boiling water and added herbs to give hair the shine and fragrance.

I grew up with shampoo bars myself in my home country, Nepal. Both India and Nepal had a lot of different brands of soap for hair. Liquid shampoos were available but they were quite expensive back then. Most of the soaps we used were made in India. Shikakai was one of the key ingredients in these soaps. As I was growing up we could go to the market and buy dried shikakai pods. I remember us soaking them to make soapy & sudsy water. It used to give us hours of entertainment.

I also started using Henna on my hair instead of chemical coloring. After that I came across Ancie nt Formulae shikakai soap for hair, quite by accident. I am so thankful that I did because I love it. I strongly feel that it is healthier than most liquid shampoos out there. There are a lot of liquid shampoos available today so reading the label is important. This particular soap is a product of India and has been quite a popular one which shows that we are choosing to live healthier lives by taking care of ourselves. In India shikakai is called “fruit for hair”. It’s been used for hair care in Indian subcontinent for centuries. While this traditional shampoo does not produce the normal amount of lather as a traditional shampoo would, it is considered a good cleanser. After reading the ingredient list I have found out that this soap does have sulfate. It is mild, having a naturally low pH, and doesn’t strip hair of natural oils. Usually no conditioner is needed, for shikakai also acts as a detangler.

The next shampoo bar I recommend is J.R. Liggett’s Herbal Soap. I personally love this shampoo bar myself. I think it’s a great family company and it’s made locally here in Cornish, New Hampshire. A number of years ago, after discovering an old New England recipe for this wonderful and unique hair soap, Mr. Liggett began making it. His family fell in love with it. Friends asked if they could try his homemade bar shampoo. Finally, he figured that if his family, his friends and himself enjoyed this shampoo so much, there might be others out there who would feel the same way. Since 1985 they have sold hundreds of thousands of bars to people all over the world. People who have used them say things like: “it doesn’t irritate my scalp” “I have gray hair and this shampoo doesn’t give it a yellow look”, “My hair’s fuller and feels healthier.”

My third recommendation for shampoo bar is Swastik Shikakai soap, which is also from India. I have not used this one myself but have heard great things about it.

I feel that we have come a full circle. We started with shampoo bars and went to liquid shampoos and today we are seeing more and more shampoo bars. Over the last year or so I have completely given up using liquid shampoo and interchange between the Ancie nt Formulae shikakai soap & J.R. Liggett’s Herbal Soap.

Laundry bar is another thing we use in Nepal. To this day everyone still uses handmade or machine made laundry soap. Powder detergent is used only for soaking whites. In most homes washer and dryer are not used in Nepal. Women wash the dirty laundry by hand. Every Saturday you see courtyard full of women doing laundry. We usually have a heaping pile of it and you start with all the whites first. First you wet your dirty laundry in water bowl (large open bowls) and then you use your laundry soap on each piece of laundry. Then you rub them to make sure all the dirt and grimes come off. Then you wring it from that soapy bowl and pass them into another bowl. There usually are 4-5 large bowls and buckets full of water that each piece of garment goes through. When the water runs clean without any suds/bubbles (by the 5^th bucket) you wring it out and then put in a clean empty bucket. So each piece of garment goes through this process and gets piled in a bucket. Then they are hung on a cloth line for drying. Doing laundry can go anywhere from 1-5 hours depending on the number of helping hands. I loved doing laundry when I was growing up back home.

I would love to hear from you if you have a favorite shampoo bar that you use.

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Shampoo Bars

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