Umbrella Breakthrough

The random homeless guy who
declared me to be queen of England
(without even knowing my real name,
mind you), insisted I take his picture,
and tried to kiss me.

This last week I suffered a tragedy that actually led me to a breakthrough of the problem of street harassment. As previously mentioned, it's of the worst parts of living here and an injustice I refuse to accept. But this story starts far from the men-filled streets, up in the forest on a hike. Somewhere between sitting down for our picnic in the river at the Absalon hot springs and the end of our long, uphill trek to the nearest bus stop, I lost my only hat here, a freebie from a senior event at Columbia. I was devastated, not because I especially liked the hat but because I was frustrated with myself for losing it and had no other form of physical sun protection for my face.

Last spotting of my dear hat.

On Thursday I had to handle this situation. However, since both straw hats and bucket hats look dumb and I was tired of carrying around my rain jacket, anyway, I decided to buy an umbrella instead of another hat. I paid too much for it in a corner shop and went about my way (as if I was busy).
The change in my quality of life was immediate.
First of all, carrying the umbrella already makes you out as an independent asshole who doesn't care how precious they look, because they're going about with an umbrella up in the sun regardless of what anybody thinks. So, people approach you less.

I have honestly heard the absolute
 weirdest comments about my appearance. 

Then, it's a physical barrier between you and other people. It both hides your face and discourages any comments anyone could logically make about it and keeps them from getting close to you.

I still need to come up with a hat,
though, since umbrellas aren't very
practical on hikes, like the one that
led me to this beautiful view.

Finally, carrying about an umbrella makes you more physically threatening. Apparently men who fail to gather from my crossing the street to avoid them, refusing to make eye contact with them, and walking quickly away from them that I don't want to talk to them can ascertain from the slightest shake of the folded umbrella in my hand that I might just fucking whack them with it. One little flick of the wrist and the guy who was veering towards me is suddenly veering away.
I feel so liberated.
Mind you, I suffer from no illusions about the complete efficacy of this tactic. I'm sure that the most aggressive street harassers will still bother me. However, whereas I endured several instances a day of street harassment sans umbrella, I've yet to suffer a single one since I've had it, and that's a change I can deal with.