Last night shook me for good.
All my life I have lived in Delhi. Even the most ignorant of the crowd, is aware of the safety of women in the city, thanks to the media people who cry themselves hoarse describing the city’s perverse acts. An average Delhite male is claimed to be as disrespectful to women as one can get. He is someone who doesn’t hesitate to pass a casual, lure comment or make a sexual advance towards the most prudish girl.
Sounds filthy? Isn’t it? But yesterday, I realized that this sort of filth exists everywhere. Even in a place like Germany, where you are not on your guards, for the simple reason that you never anticipate that it can happen to you. At least out here.
Life gave me some serious jolts lately and consequently I have not been acting my own self for the past few days. Sick and tired of being whiny and sulky all the time I visited Ulmer Munster (the tallest cathedral in the world),to gather myself up a little bit. The only mistake I did, was taking the liberty of going at 9 in the night, alone, all by myself.
While I was trying to count my blessings and all the good things that life has to offer, I realised, I wasn’t the only one sitting on the bench, on that cold, dark night. The revolting stench of alcohol emitted by a man in his late twenties made me aware of his presence too. A kind of guy with very urban..supposidely modern outlook..a respectable composure. Someone with whom you would not think twice before having lunch in mensa, cracking a joke or two, the one who will probably get a decent job in the near future. A man who makes his girl proud for what he is and would even stab if someone tries to touch the womenfolk in his family.
I have no reasons on this earth, then why he chose me, to witness the disgusting lecher within him.
Since I was sobbing, he thought I was weak and vulnerable. He started off with extending his help to “ease my suffering” (first in Deutsch and later on graduating to English when he realised that I didn’t get the language).
I will spare you the unsavoury details but I was too shocked to retaliate in the beginning. All I heard at that point of time was a noise, of a very strange kind. It was like a mixture of wounded soldiers screaming out in a battlefield, whining of a distressed woman, howling of an animal in pain. I just can’t explain it. But when I gained my senses back, I reacted sharply. He smirked and I completely lost it, so much so that I shouted out a deafening shriek. No exaggerations intended, but trust me, half a minute more and I would have killed him, then and there.
My momma didn’t raise me a dummy. That bastard took me for nuts to think that at 10 in the night, I would be floored, thinking about his genuinely selfless gesture and altruism to gladly do a favour for a stranger like me. And to emulate his benevolence, I would comply with his request to get laid with him.
On realising that he was wrong in taking me for a cheap knock-off of a Moulin Rouge beauty, he left, grinning like the true asshole that he was. The corny, vulgar stuff he blurted out, his sickening breath, the thought of him, all of it, still makes me want to run to the loo and throw up. Fucker.
I don’t want to make this post sound like a cluster of swear words stringed together by a wailing, frustrated woman who is either too ignorant to express herself properly or too lazy to look for subtle expressions. This blog isn’t a mere shout-box for me.
Nor do I intend to pass on a holier-than-thou judgement on men and make a gross generalisation. That’s the last thing on my mind. In fact, throughout my life, most of my good friends have belonged to the opposite sex, and I still maintain that belief.
I just wonder what makes some men the way they are. I’m sure none of them ever wish to humiliate women out of their own volition. Then what is it? Which societal norm, which school of thought makes them subject their female counterparts to such huge mortification?
There are no boundaries that define the group of people who deserve to be respected. Disrespect for any living being is against the very principle of existence. Although unacceptable on any grounds,whatsoever, but for once I can gulp down, if I see this orthodox malice coming from an uncouth man. But it’s surreal, that more often than not, women are subjugated to such oppressive behaviour by the so called “educated” fraction of the society. And this makes me reckon the literacy rate of the world.
