Well, it was raining all afternoon, towards evening today... The continuous downpour with its rhythmic beats, the gentle breeze leaving my curls totally messed, and the magical darkness around, yeah, it was a perfect evening in my dictionary...And the best thing I could think of doing in such a pretty weather was to land up at my favourite coffee joint, have few cups of hot coffee, and of course letting me be with myself.... It took just five minutes for me to take the final call on this, and in the next five minutes, I was in my destination, the brilliantly lit coffee shop... As I got into the shop, the downpour sped up... Well, I didn't complain... Rather I realized, I was actually going to love it... I placed my order while taking the most comfortable seat in the corner of the shop, and in next five minutes my table had all, that I needed... An aromatic mug of strong warm coffee, a plate of chocolate-sauce-dipped chocolate fantasy, and of course my much-adored phone in my hand... As I started sipping on my coffee, I decided to surf net too... And as I did, I realized, even if I was not following aggressively, a lot was going on, around me, and these were actually things that should have made me worry in a rather serious way...
Actually, it's been almost a couple of days now, since I first came across the horrifying news of a school-kid, a young girl getting molested by a gang of men... Well, this is certainly not the very first time that I've come across something like this, but this is mere one, among those many soul-shrinking times, that makes me pity on the society we live in... And, this time, I'm actually disgusted and also unable to take it at all, for, the place where it happened is the same place I belong to, and for a matter-of-fact, I always had high, in fact very high regards for the place, at least owing to the fact that, people there always have a broader and much more advanced approach to living life, if you consider on a normal scale... But alas, I was so wrong!!! I forgot, that ultimately, it also is a part of the continuously degrading society, which, in million occasions, forget about the basic humanitarian ground, on which we need to stand upon in a real sense, as a part of the most evolved race, i.e. the human race... Alas, in millions and millions occasions, we just forget that, we need to evolve more, if possible, not the other way round which might lead us to the cave-age, in which we were no more than other animals... Well, I think, I shouldn't blame the innocent animals here, I hardly think despite being dumb and less intelligent than human beings, an animal would by any means bother to molest a fellow female... Does that leave us worse than them... Well, I have a strong feeling, yes, it does...
I'm not a hard-core feminist and I don't scream out asking why we're not treated equally as the male counterparts of ours in the society... I have no such demands that we should also be made to go through everything that a male needs to go through... All I believe is that, as human beings, we all, regardless of males and females, are supposed to have the basic right to feel free of doing things which by no means disturb others' existence, and thereby not making the societal balance shake... I believe, everyone in the society needs to have the feeling of belonging-ness to the same, and this would come only if we are let live in a way in which respect is a common entity... I believe in order to realize that we're a part of the modern world, we need to have the basic rights to feel free of choosing the ways to living, of doing things of our interest, and of course of making the small happinesses pave their way to our daily life... But, just cuz someone is female why she needs to sacrifice on these points, that remains beyond my understanding and beyond my imagination too...
Coming back to the molestation of the school kid, as the media says, she was eve-teased first, with sadistic remarks... This is one point I always refuse to take... Why does it always happen that when a girl is alone on streets, male counterparts turn into nothing more than street-dogs... I, myself have experienced it in million occasions... On the streets of big metros, small towns and suburbs, everywhere the picture stays the same... And, if someone wants to ask me if I was in my shortest clothes in those times, for them to know, well, I was not... It hardly matters for anyone with such a desperate attitude to leech after a female, to consider what she's wearing, what she looks like and what she's doing at that place... The mere fact that she belongs to the species 'Female', is more than enough for these low lives to bring themselves to get involved in anything that by no standard can be called decent and humanitarian... Such is the society we live in...
Coming back, I was mentioning about the incidents (guess 'accidents' or 'mishaps' would be apter terms) I had faced in the similar line... Well, fortunately (at least as far as these situations are concerned), I'm a totally lazy person, and thereby I hardly take a walk along streets at any point in any day, and also avoid taking public transports when it's crowded... And that leaves me opt for a cab or an auto in most of the times (and which also by no means safe at all)... Still there are certain rare occasions when I have no options than taking a walk, and the incidents that I want to talk about have all happened in some of these times only...
The first time when I faced something really ugly was during Ganesh Puja in Bangalore... It was almost 3 years back, and it was the last day of the weeklong festival, and so, was the time when a procession had taken the idol to float it in water in a nearby lake, a way to say goodbye to Ganeshji for that year... Well, I was coming back from my evening grocery shopping, and as usual my hands were occupied... The crowd was approaching from the other end, hence I decided to stay back on the other side of the street to avoid the same, and once it was pass me, I thought it was time I could take my steps back home... But suddenly I realized, there was someone trying to pull my shopping bags, and the moment I looked towards him, he slapped across my face... I was horrified, but as soon as I could realize what was happening, I tried screaming at him... My scream did make few other people gather... But the irony was, not to help me, but to irritate me even further... Some of them started commenting on me for being Nepali (which I am not), some called me 'Chinki', and I was all alone in a crowd of disgusting looking, dirty-eyed gang... Thankfully, the episode couldn't take a sadder turn than that, cuz few of my friends, who belonged to that locality fortunately had turned up for their evening tea at a stall nearby, and they came rushing to help me out... Of course they wouldn't have let anything happen to me, but I still wonder, what if, they hadn't turned up at that moment that day... It makes me literally shiver...
The second time, when I had to repeat facing such ugliness was a time when I was not keeping well, and hence had gone to get food from a nearby outlet... Well, it was a little late, but I was not alone... I was with my friend on whose bike I had gone out... After we got my parcel, my friend went to fetch his bike from the parking, and I was standing just outside the store, which also happens to be the main road... Two minutes on that road, and I could see my friend coming back too... And just at that moment, someone came rushing from nowhere and pulled my jacket... And before I could respond to it, my friend came rushing, and so did two other strangers, and they scared this low-life away, and I was rescued... Nothing much happened to me, apart from my heart turning infuriated against this sort of disgusting desperate males, and that of course is nothing positive...
Well, these were just two major mishaps taking place in my 25 years old of feminine existing... I'm not listing the minor setbacks that I come across on a weekly, fortnightly or monthly basis... That's cuz my whole point is not to list down all these negativities, and thereby screaming, and complaining about how difficult it is to live in the society I live in, and how bad it is to be a female... Certainly that's not my focus... My point here is, why is it the way it is??? A healthy society needs both males and females to unite together to think about and thereby walk towards what we call as 'progress'.... But, how would it be possible if one decides to trouble the other one in doing so, and thereby creating a crippled mankind???
Every negative action on females leaves me get worried on this one point, and that has nothing to do with who's better and who's not... And this point being, on the thoughts of the ones who get unknown pleasure in doing wrong to the females in the society... And, this has everything to do with, why does everything end up in bias???
I turn worried and speechless seeing the in-genuine behaviour towards a girl doing things as per her own norms... I fail to understand, why people don't realize how the simple thought of letting one live by her wish can stop creating all these troubles... I do not find a reason why it's so necessary to trouble the girl walking on roads alone, instead of being focused on the jobs that we need to finish before that particular day ends... I'm so certain that, that way, we would end up having a much more productive day than otherwise we would have...
The saddest part of all what I say, and did now too, is that, I can't do much more than just cribbing, writing it on my personal blog, and keeping all my friends informed when I have to end up being alone in a place, so that the moment I smell terror, any of them can come in my rescue... What else can I possibly do??? I don't wear my favourite pair of shorts while going anywhere alone, lest I might draw attention of un-necessary gazes... I avoid wearing my elegant and sexy looking formal frocks, lest I draw eye-balls of few testosterone-driven idiots around, I don't wear anything sleeveless, lest some irritating strangers bug me.... Well, how much can I possibly avoid doing??? The list doesn't end, neither does the list of probabilities and consequences that I might face when I'm alone on streets end... Do you see a point why I'm worried??? I'm sure you do...
On a personal level, I always prefer to just stroll around the place I live, click some random pictures of the beauty around, sipping on some take-away coffees, sitting on some deserted bench to scribble in my diary, getting into the depth of a new novel, or for that matter, just spending some time, only with myself while roaming around aimlessly... But sadly enough, I don't do any of these outside my house, cuz, that leads me getting few un-necessary, un-worthy strangers to take peek and thereby stalk me, and thereby leaving a scope to get harassed by them... Yeah, for this plain reason, I never walk alone on roads, I don't like to even sit in a cab alone, and what worse, I don't even want to step out of my house during weekends... Cuz, weekends bring everyone out of their respective homes, leading to creating a massive crowd, and bigger is the crowd, more are chances to get myself in trouble... Huh, how much do I need to think... I wonder, whether a guy actually think, or has to think from so many perspectives, or rather, do they even consider these to be something that need to be considered at all??? I don't have the answer, neither do I have an answer to what if I stop caring about the crowd around??? Difficult??? Yeah!!! Most certainly it is...
Well, I didn't wish to put this up on my blog... Cuz I realize, it's my relentless cribbing on something that I have no way and energy to change... Cuz, I realize it's not at all in my hands that I could do anything to change the way people, oh, the desperate lot, looks at females... Cuz, I realize, exactly like me millions others too, have the same set of complaints against the way the society operates, especially with these irregularities... But unfortunately enough, noone manages to have a ground to fight these... And, the story remains the same, one set always trying to take advantage of the weaker lot and the other set, like me, always trying to avoid these situations, and thereby ending up adjusting in so many aspects that it doesn't stay funny anymore....
News channels, Facebook, Twitter everyone is extremely engaged in reporting about the incident taking place in the city I come from... It shrinks my soul, it makes me scream out loud as to why it had to be that way, it makes me curse the gang who didn't bother to think that she could also have been any of theirs sister or girl-friend and so...., it makes me rethink of the modernity that we so proudly talk about... Basically it makes me just worry on as to on what grounds we would still be called as best of God's creation... We're certainly not the best that God created, cuz, we have proved Him wrong, all the time...
As I finished my coffee, I saw a gang of girls rushing into the coffee shop... A gang of teenagers with a bundle of relentless laughter, a bundle of non-restricted happiness, and in their glamorous and prettiest best... They made me feel little better... Their spirited and joyous attitude actually refreshed me... But, at the same time, I just wished, none of them have to go through anything that the innocent school girl had to go through, and that too, just cuz of being the fairer sex... I just wish, each of these girls, and everyone out there gets to enjoy the beauty of being a female, and not the other way round where they need to be scared of being the same...
I just wish, someday, somewhere we see a light, that leads us to a broader way.... A way, away from all these terrors, away from all the pain, and yeah, towards a space, where everyone breathes equal...
