Oh No You Didn't!

Maybe it's the heat, but I am not putting up with shit.

When there's a bit of harassment in a crowded area, like a servees or a souq, there's always a little doubt about whether that brush-up was intentional or not. If intentional, I want to go off on a mother so he thinks twice before oops! letting his hand wander again. If not, I don't want to be a crazy person going off a poor guy who just got caught up in the crowd. Most women go through this same calculation, I think, and many of us err on the side of "well, maybe it was accidental". Then later we think, "Oh that was totally intentional. Eww." and feel like idiots for not having at least made a scene.

But I am making some scenes.

Last week on my way to work my head was buried in my book (Bab ash-Shams, Elias Khoury) when I felt a hand graze my side. The guy next to me had shifted his weight, and his arm crossed with the other, and the hand rubbed against me a bit. I gave him the benefit of the doubt and kept reading. A little later, he leaned over and whispered something in my ear. I didn't catch but the last of it cause I wasn't paying attention, but intentions were clear.

So I straightened, and very loudly, for all the servees to hear, said "What? What do you want? Don't whisper!" Everyone looked at the dude, who looked deeply embarrassed, and didn't bother me again on the ride.

A couple of days later I was in the Jeramana servees when I relealized there was a hand at my back, on the side. I have no idea how long that hand had been there, but it belonged to the man sitting behind me, who was holding on to the seat in front of him from the side, and just managed to put his hand behind me. I didn't even think, but automatically turned and slapped the hand, which withdrew and immediately signalled for the servees to pull over so he could get his guilty ass out. Guilty as SLAP!

But the latest scene was not made by me. I was riding with some friends when one of them noticed the guy sitting across from us was engrossed by my skirt's hemline. He waved his hand in front of the guy's face, then they got into a shouting match. The other passengers calmed them down, and the man moved to another seat. Perhaps my friends overreacted, but ever since I told them about what happened when that guy attacked me, and other girlfriends jumped in with similar stories, some of the dudes have gotten very protective of us.