Maury's Hat Redux

4 June 2016

We're enjoying our time in Panajachel, which is very pretty and quaint.  

We found a great spot for breakfast, which even has bagels!  So our morning routine tends to be brekkie on the front porch of the Uptown Deli.  (Yes, there's also a downtown deli.)

Part of hanging out on the porch of a café means seeing people walking by, which we enjoy.  And the other part means the wandering vendors see us, and come by to sell items.  We don't enjoy that quite as much.

But the cutest are the little shoe shine boys, who walk around with boxes full of shining equipment, and I guess you rest your foot on the box.  No idea, really, we both have non-leather sandals.  In fact, one child today tried to convince me that I need the rubber toes of my nylon webbing sandals shined up.  (Today was Saturday, so there were more of the kids around.)

The kids asked for a quetzal, so they could buy some food.  (One quetzal is one-seventh of a dollar - maybe 12 or 13 cents.)  So I said I'd pay them a quetzal for a photo.  Seemed fair.  But there were two brothers, so that would mean two quetzales, and they agreed that meant two photos.

Richard managed to get the little brother to do bunny ears on the older brother.  Gee, I wonder where he gets ideas like that?

Okay, the saga of Dad's hat continues.  We sort of thought about retiring the hat, because it was looking pretty sad.  Dirty after several years of travel, and the hatband was shredding when touched.  

We were heading to Rapa Nui at the time, knowing the hat would love that visit.  Between the geology and the moai made of rock, it seemed like a perfect place for the hat to live out his last years.  We thought that might be his last lap.

So I polled my sister and three brothers, and we all agreed:  if the hat needed to be retired, Rapa Nui would be the perfect spot.

But the hat had SO much fun travelling around the island with us.  Richard and I didn't have the heart to give him away to someone else.  We didn't have the heart to just abandon him.  So the hat continued on with us.

And I gave him a makeover.

He was washed and scrubbed and hung up to dry.  He took three days to dry completely in Lima.  The old hatband came off.  I peeled off the dried glue, and made some minor repairs before we arrived in Guatemala.

With our shopping, we decided that the woven sashes would be great for a new hatband.  Earthy colors seemed best for the beige color of the hat.  So I found a red and brown band, something like agates or jasper, that kind of rock coloration.  Which kind of perks up the hat and gives him a jaunty look. 

The hat had his first outing styling his new look today.  Not only was he happy to be out in the sun, and hanging out in Guatemala, he was thrilled to fit into the crowd of Maya people wearing similar woven clothing.  Okay, he towered over the Maya people, but he still was smiling.

Then he saw the volcanic lake, and the stromboli-type volcanoes in the distance, and he was literally bouncing up and down on Richard's head!

So, the hat seems quite happy with his makeover.

And we're happy that he's still on the road with us. 

PS - You usually see the back of the hat, because he's looking at the geological features which are in the background of the photo.