Mzungu in a hat

You'd think there isn't a lot I could do to make it any more obvious in my tiny jungle town that I am, in fact, not a Kenyan. I wear strange clothes and odd shoes and do not have a baby strapped anywhere to my body. I do not carry things on my head, I have straight hair, and let's not forget that I am white, a detail that can be seen from a 1/2 mile down the road.

The other mzungus and I have become accustomed to being the talk of the town, to being stared at and proposed to. So I really couldn't get any more weird, right? Wrong. I am apparently the only mzungu who regularly wears sunglasses and a huge floppy white sun hat. I know it's ridiculous, but I look pretty ridiculous already and why not keep cool (cooler) and get the sun out of my eyes while I'm at it?

I swear I get even more weird looks from Kenyans when I wear my hat, although Megan thinks I may just be hat-sensitive. But people do look at me even more strangely. Lately too, I've been getting my hand kissed a lot by kids and adult males. The latest development though is with a group of 6 little boys who I walk past on my way to the office a few times a day. Yesterday as I came down the path, one boy started to salute me - hand to forhead and all - and instruct the others to do the same. This morning, same group of boys, lined up on either side of the path and all saluted, complete with a "ten-hut" and a little stomp by the leader-boy as I walked through. I checked with the other volunteers and no one has had that experience. I think it must be the hat.