To tell you the truth, it’s somewhat embarrassing. Normally I wouldn’t even mention it because I’m uncomfortable bringing attention to my appealing qualities. Nevertheless, for posterity’s sake I feel it best to shed momentarily my accustomed humility in favor of the more illuminating, unbiased facts as I perceive them.

You see, not long after arriving in Pakali it became apparent that – how can I put this humbly and delicately? – a number of young Wilo girls were quite obsessed with me. There, I said it.

It’s true. Perhaps it could be attributed to my urbane, polished manner. Or maybe it was my shiny white skin and mysterious accent. I don’t know. What I do know is that, whether walking down to the river, meandering throughout the village, or entering a house, I rarely failed to cause quite a stir among those of that particular demographic.

How was I so certain that these young ones were smitten with me? Well, it couldn’t have been clearer had it been written in big blue block letters across a cloudless sky. Whenever I would stroll toward one of these girls, their eyes would be glued to my every move until I had made my way past them and well beyond. Some would stand frozen and stare up at me in a wide-eyed, disconcerted manner, while others would whisper things about me urgently to those around them. Indeed, the Fonz of Happy Days fame never elicited such enraptured reactions as I did in Pakali.

The youngest of my admirers would often coyly hide their true emotions behind a brilliant disguise of terror. Yeah, right. It might have been believable if they hadn’t overdone it to such an extreme. I could see right through the façade. The older, more mature admirers, those who had already learned how to walk and talk a bit, were less dissimulating, at times being so forward as to tentatively delve into my personal life, asking questions like where I was going.

They were all taken with my sense of humor. My one-liners, even when I wasn’t particularly trying to be funny, would often send them into gales of appreciative laughter. Such was their admiration that they would even call their friends over to hear me repeat what I had just said. If you have ever seen the black-and-white footage of fans screaming and fainting at a single glimpse of the Beatles, then you can picture the kind of reception I often elicited from these girls.

I tried not to let it all go to my head, but it was hard being humble when virtual strangers would actually start shouting and practically swooning whenever I approached. Sometimes they would run home, impacted to the point of tears, no doubt to breathlessly tell of their close encounter with moi. At other times, with their large brown eyes they would simply cast me a “go thither” look, peeking out from behind their mother, overcome with shyness at my presence.

Someone with less insight might have assumed these children were reacting in fear. They certainly did put forth a convincing act. But I wasn’t fooled. I may be many things, but delusional I am not. Just because someone runs off screaming, doesn’t mean they are terrified, right? I mean, any number of emotions might produce that kind of behavior.

And just because all the parents of these young ones kept telling them that I was a cannibal and that I would take them away if they misbehaved, that doesn’t mean that they actually believed it. Who would believe something like that about me? Not these adoring kids, that’s for sure.

But familiarity does breed contempt, and I found that, as time passed, all my admirers began losing some of that enthusiasm. They stopped reacting to me and began treating me like I was just a normal person, sometimes even ignoring me completely.

I held up as best I could in the face of this demotion from superstardom to a has-been. But whenever visitors from other villages happened to pass through, I would approach them and the look of rapturous admiration in the eyes of the children would transport me back on the magic carpet of nostalgia to those early days when my many young admirers would scream and shout at the very sight of me. Ahh, for the good ol’ days.

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