Hand Some

I am a delicate little flower.  No really.  I catch the sun very easily.  Thankfully, living in Britain, the sun is only a legend, trotted out by wizened old men to scare small children who won’t wear their raincoats.  Here, apparently, the sun is part of everyday life.  Weird.

Anyway, like the good cub scout I am, I have come prepared.  Needless to say I forgot my hat.  However, I have secured a bargain replacement after haggling with a vendor on the street corner.  Although my new headwear looks a little like a flowery tea cosy and carries some quaint local dialect (‘Turista Stupid’ on the front and ‘Retroceda-me’ on the back), the bearded man assures me that these are the latest in local fashion.  I hand over $50 confident that I am now indistinguishable from the residents.

Resplendent in my new hat and with an inch of sun cream applied over every piece of skin I can reach, I set off for a day’s adventure.  Strangely, I do seem to be object of some attention from the locals, but I suspect that is because the latest fashions take a while to get out here to The Sticks.  I smile benignly as globs of SPF 50 drip onto my aloha shirt.

Some hours later, we return to our room.  Looking in the mirror, I am relieved to see a familiar pasty white face staring back at me.  Same pallid etiolated skin, saggy tired eyes and balding pate.  God, T is a lucky woman.

For the best part of the afternoon, everything has been a bit of blur because of the lotion and sweat in my eyes but now I can see I have some colour.  Admittedly, it’s not the sort of tan that one might recognise from the catwalk, but I am the proud possessor of not one, but two, vividly sunburnt hands.  Just my hands.  Nothing else.  It looks like I’m wearing bright red gloves.  I’m like a Technicolor minstrel who’s run out of rouge after covering his fingers.

I stand naked in our room, arms outstretched (it’s not a pleasant image, I know).  My hands glow in the fading light.  T is laughing uncontrollably.  So too is Baby.  But I’m sure they’re laughing with me.  Because laughter is the best medicine, right?

Comments

[Mrs RW]

Oh, this so reminds me of my first trip to Mexico! I thought I had carefully covered every inch of skin with SPF 100...until I woke up the next morning with blisters the size of cabbages on the top of my ears and down the part in my hair...ouch, ouch, double ouch!!

You can always tell the rube from a cold climate. We're the ones who sunburn in the most ridiculously obvious places. The locals must really laugh their a---s off looking at us!

[Carlton]

Ow! Ow! Ow! At least with such obvious forms of identification it's easier to pass through Customs! c.