From public administration to beauty salon
Lina Taha has opened a beauty salon, ”Beauty by M&L”. The M stands for Mohammed, the L is Lina’s own.
– Nothing happens by chance. Everything I have done in my life has been leading up to this.
In 2016 she started the closed Facebook group ”Honey & the bees”. Today it is one of Sweden’s biggest girl groups, with more than 140 000 members, and it covers beauty topics such as make-up, clothes and cosmetic surgery.
After a year Lina registered ”Honey and the bees” as a company. She became an influencer and blogger on family life and relations.
She kept on working at the same time in her state job. At the moment she is on parental leave.
– When I was small I wanted to join the police. Then I wanted to manage a hotel, work in public administration and with UN. I want to try out lots of of different things, says Lina Taha.
In the upper secondary school she studied on the hotel and restaurant programme. She worked in the branch for one summer, but she found it to be ”very tough, physically very demanding”.
– That came as a shock. I didn’t know what I should study. Then Dad said, ”Choose whatever you like, as long as you have a university education.”
She applied to the School of Social Studies, but didn’t get a place. Now she is glad that she chose Human Rights and Migration instead.
– I thought it was very interesting, and I enjoyed my time at Malmö university. If I had known I would work with beauty I would have chosen the Health Care programme, or perhaps Commercial Studies at the upper secondary school. But how are you to know when you’re just 15?
”I admire girls and women from abroad. I know what difficulties you can run into, for example discrimination and indirect racism.”
She was ten when her family fled from Baghdad. When she was only 16 she began to work extra after school.
Now she is inspired by other immigrant women who set up on their own.
– I’m in contact on the social media with a girl from Karlskrona. She’s from Iraq too, and has opened her own salon. I admire girls and women from abroad. I know what difficulties you can run into, for example discrimination and indirect racism.
Last year she hit upon the idea of opening a beauty salon. She and her husband Mohammed found premises in a cellar near where they live in Näsby. They renovated the cellar and attended various courses in Gothenburg and Stockholm.
Lina was expecting a baby. Her son Elijah was born in November, and at the beginning of February she opened the salon. She is in her element.
– It’s great being able to work with people in a different way. I have contact with most of my clients via the social media. It’s always fun to meet them face to face.