Heroes, legends and cowboy hats

I was scanning the news headlines last week when the announcement of Chuck Norris’ death caught my attention.

I know relatively little about Chuck Norris. I do know he was a legendary martial artist and a karate world champion, but I have never actually sat down and watched one of his movies. Even so, when I learned that he had passed I stopped what I was doing and thought about Chuck Norris. Thinking about Chuck Norris made me remember Africa. It’s not as odd as it may sound. In the early days of my travels on the continent I discovered that Chuck Norris is a legend in Africa. In every country I visited I met young men and boys who absolutely idolized him.

Like most tourists in Africa, I was asked where I came from multiple times a day. “America” was my simple response. It was quick, always recognizable, and never resulted in my receiving blank stares and looks of confusion in return like new friends from places such as the Czech Republic and Croatia often did.

I was in a South African bus station one day when the young man atop the bus untying our luggage not only asked me where I was from but surprised me by asking, “Which place?” after I told him “America.” “Texas,” I called up to him and he stopped untying the rope around my backpack. His eyes widened with appreciation. “Walker Texas Ranger!” he cried. A huge smile spread across his face. He raised an arm high in the air and gave me a thumb’s up. Several other young men rushed over excited to meet this woman who hailed from the same place as Walker Texas Ranger. Their enthusiasm was infectious and after that I always answered, “Texas” when asked where I was from. It never failed. “Walker Texas Ranger! Walker Texas Ranger!” Smiles, cheers, stories of praise for Chuck Norris.

I have a sweet memory from Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe. I was sitting with my friend Ronald at his jewelry and curio stand when a friend of his, a young man who led a traditional dance troupe, called out and waved to him from across the street. Ro waved back and then said to me, “That’s the guy with Chuck Norris’ hat.” And he told me a story.

Chuck Norris had visited Victoria Falls not too long before. Unlike other celebrities who shall remain nameless in this essay, he came without an entourage and he staged no photo ops nor arranged special dinners with city officials. He came with just his wife during a time when tourist dollars were badly needed but tourists were few and far between. The group of young dancers were performing as they did most days to a small crowd of mostly locals and bored shopkeepers when suddenly he appeared: Chuck Norris, Walker Texas Ranger in the flesh! He and his wife stopped and watched the performance. I had seen these young men perform many times. I was so impressed with them. They came from poor families who lived in small crowded houses in the nearby township. Some of them had never had the money needed to pay school fees and had never been allowed to go to school. They lived in a country spiraling into economic ruin offering them little reason to look to the future with optimism. But each day they donned traditional Ndebele attire and walked to town where they always put on a great show whether there were tourists to watch them and fill their tip basket or not. I imagine they performed even better the day one of their heroes unexpectedly appeared. Ro went on to tell me that when the performance ended, the leader, Ro's friend who had just waved to us, walked up to Chuck Norris, removed his headdress and held it out as a gift. “For you,” he said nervously. And Chuck Norris, without stopping to think about it, without needing a camera crew to record it, immediately took his signature black cowboy hat off and placed it on the young man’s head. “Now he will always be the guy who got Chuck Norris’ hat,” Ronald said. admiration shining on his face.

I would hear that same story from several other people while I was in Victoria Falls. Not only had Chuck Norris made one of his biggest fans, a young man who had so little, extremely happy, he’d made him “small town famous.” I loved that story the first time I heard it. I love it now years later. I became a Chuck Norris fan even though I still have never seen one of his movies.

All these years later, when I saw that Chuck Norris had died, I decided to go online and see if there were any references to his trip to Vic Falls back in the early 2000’s. I found nothing. Not a single reference. It had never occurred to me until that moment that this story might have been more local legend than historical fact. I reminded myself that although we had the internet then we did not have social media as we have it today. No Instagram, no so-called Influencers. There may have been a few people using Myspace, but Facebook was still in its college-students-only infancy. Also, as each of the people who told the story to me said, Norris and his wife had come as normal people, not celebrities, so perhaps having no online footprint makes sense.

I suppose it is also possible that the story, perhaps inspired by wishes and fantasy, evolved into something bigger than that day until it became part of the town’s folklore. It’s made me think about myth and reality and how legends are made and can blur fact into fiction. Kind of like Chuck Norris / Walker Texas Ranger himself.

For the record I do believe the story happened. I saw “the guy with Chuck Norris’ hat.” I saw Ro’s face when he called him that, and I heard the excitement in the voices of others who also told me the story. I saw how Walker Texas Ranger had inspired boys and young men in villages and townships and urban jungles all across Africa. I wonder if Chuck Norris knew what he had meant to them. I hope he did.