An American Girl Around the World

Sometimes I really wish I wasn’t born a girl. I am likely to express these sentiments if you catch me when I have my period (I usually spend a couple of days clutching a heating pad and moaning that I am going to rip out my uterus) or after I’ve tried on every pair of jeans in Montgomery Mall and still haven’t found even one that fits. I hate cattiness, backstabbing, and walking in heels, but what I hate most about being a girl is being treated like a whore.
It’s an occupational hazard of being female all over the world. In India, a white girl is basically the same thing as an expensive prostitute. And that’s how the men there treated me – like a whore they couldn’t afford. After two days of being leered at like a walking, talking porn film, I packed away my make-up, tied my hair back, and threw on my dad’s clothes. I never ever even stepped foot outside the house without my parents or my brother, and was deeply grateful for the guard who watched the house at night.
Despite these precautions, my hips became the focal point of the male population anywhere I dared venture. If I glared at any of the men who were obviously mentally removing my baggy men’s clothes (usually a t-shirt that came down to my knees and loose cotton pants), they just smirked and continued ogling me like I had a sign around my neck that said, “I am the physical embodiment of all of your sexual fantasies.”  Sometimes they even called to their friends, congregating in groups to point and yell suggestively at me as I slouched in humiliation, wishing fervently that there was a nice hole in the ground that I could crawl into and die. Of course, I don’t speak Hindi, but sexual banter, like a smile, is the same in any language. 
This sort of behavior was epitomized on a trip Kerala – a part of India overflowing with palm trees, spice plantations and beautiful beaches. One scorching afternoon near the beginning of our trip, my family stuffed the car with towels, sushi mats, and sunscreen, and traveled to a completely deserted beach to go swimming. Within about ten minutes, we, or more specifically, my mom and I, had an audience. First five men showed up. Then ten, fifteen, twenty, and twenty-five. They stood and sat in rows on the beach, just staring at us, and then some of them took out cameras and video cameras. I treaded water, trying to keep everything other than my head underwater (because it sure as heck wasn’t my face they were interested in) and hoping they would get bored and leave. They didn’t. I love the ocean and I always have, but eventually, I stopped bobbing on the crests of waves and started thrashing in troughs that seemed to get deeper and deeper. My arms and legs were starting to cramp, but I was afraid to get out of the water.
Then, there was an outbreak of talk from the shore, and about half the men stood up and started walking. Finally! They were leaving! But, no, wait, they were walking towards the water. And stripping off their jeans. And wading into the ocean. And swimming towards us. Crap. I was near tears, my mom looked panicky, and my little sister was wide-eyed because she could tell Mommy was scared, and Mommy never gets scared. My dad yelled at the men, and, at first, they backed off. But about two minutes later they were swimming towards us again, looking more determined this time. I was stuck between the dog-paddling men in the water and the camera-wielding ones on the beach. I decided to take my chances with the ones who were still fully clothed – if they were going to try to rape me they had more steps to go through than the ones who were already practically naked. In what seemed like a coordinated assault, the men in the water turned to follow me as the men on the beach converged on me, jeering in Malayalam and clicking away with their cameras. The rest of my family staggered out of the water and grabbed our belongings as the men started closing in. I didn’t exactly run to the car (I didn’t want to give those perverts the satisfaction) but I got pretty darn close. Even after I was safe behind the tinted windows of our SUV, my heart didn’t resume its normal rate for an hour.
You’d think that I would have learned my lesson. But by that night, I was fuming rather than trembling. I had come to Kerala to enjoy the beach and I wasn’t going to let a bunch of perverts stand between me and the ocean. Nothing had really happened, after all, no one had actually touched me – I was probably overreacting. I was going to go to the beach, and woe betide anyone who got in my way. The next day my family and I went to a beach we had carefully chosen because it was supposed to be extremely safe and tourist friendly— supposed to be being the key phrase. We hadn’t counted on the fact that the Indian army was taking a day off.
After a happy hour I spent on the mostly empty beach playing in the sand with my little brother and trying to bodysurf, the beach was overrun by a massive horde of leaping, whooping soldiers who immediately started shedding their clothes and heading for the water. For a minute or two I tried to ignore them, telling myself to stop being paranoid, and continued playing with my siblings. However, the smile on my wet, salty face froze and cracked as several of the soldiers caught sight of me. There was cheering and laughter as about one hundred and fifty of the soldiers stampeded after the white girl in a bathing suit. The writhing mass of humanity made its way after me, as, on the verge of panic, I grabbed my brother and started swimming down the coast. A mixture of catcalls, jeers, and obscene suggestions in a mixture of Malayalam and broken English echoed in my ears as I swam into deeper and deeper water to avoid my pursuers. My brother glanced back at the crowd that was swiftly gaining on us and then swam off in another direction – I still haven’t quite forgiven him for that, but after all, what was a gangly, pre-teen going to be able to do against almost two hundred soldiers? I found myself fervently wishing for a large firearm, or a meat cleaver, or pepper spray – something, anything – as they followed away me from the shore.
However, glancing behind me, I saw that the group of men following me was getting smaller. Clusters of five and ten fell away from the main group as the water got deeper. Examining their jerky dog paddling, I realized something: none of them seemed to be very good swimmers, and their awkward, inefficient dogpaddling was draining their stamina. Mentally thanking my parents for making me attend swim team for six years (an activity that I considered torture at the time), I struck out further and further from shore with practiced freestyle. After about ten minutes the crowd had shrunk to around thirty determined men, but my muscles were starting to cramp and I knew I couldn’t keep swimming out to sea forever. Maybe if I swam back quickly, I could stay ahead of the men still following me, get back to the shore and find my family. It was worth a shot. And I couldn’t think of a better plan.
Singing Jimmy Eat World’s “The Middle” under my breath, I struck out for land. Hey, don't write yourself off yet/?It's only in your head you feel left out or looked down on, I was almost halfway there. Just try your best, try everything you can/And don't you worry what they tell themselves, when you're away, as the remainder of the faction started to gain on me, I lurked briefly behind a muscular, tattooed European guy, who looked at me in puzzlement, but the soldiers’ reluctance to venture near the man who might possibly be my dad or my brother put me firmly in the lead. It just takes some time, little girl you're in the middle of the ride/?Everything (everything) will be just fine, I was almost there, closer, closer, yes! My feet touched the powdery sand and I strode out of the breaking surf onto the beach, where I plopped down in the sand next to my youngest brother, and closed my eyes with a sigh of relief. Everything (everything) will be alright (alright)…the song lyrics trailed off in my head as I opened my and eyes looked up. In the few seconds it took me to catch my breath, a thick circle of Indian men had enclosed my seven-year old brother and me. We were, quite literally, surrounded.
For a moment, I considered trying to run for it, but that would have required walking through their ranks-- getting closer to those greedy faces and sweaty, groping hands. I looked determinedly away from the chattering, leering, video-recording crowd and started to build a sandcastle with my brother. For several minutes we sat there, faking concentration on our drip castle and forcing laughter, hoping they would just get bored and leave. They didn’t. On the contrary, they started closing in, inch-by-inch, making the circle tighter as they got bolder. That was one of the three scariest moments of my life. I huddled next to my brother and made a perfect swirled turret on the castle as dozens of feet shuffled their way towards me. Meanwhile, my dad was gathering the clan for a strategic retreat to the safety of the hotel. After scanning the water and searching the south end of the beach, he investigated the animated crowd, pushed his way through, and rescued me. But, until he came, I took the only vengeance I could. Even as the men objectified me as a provocative body in a bathing suit, I objectified them into something worse: a bestial, lust-driven horde devoid of any morals, intelligence, or shame.
Five countries and thousands of miles later, I was navigating my way through the historic district of Oaxaca, Mexico. Though I had been worried at first, there was a more respectful attitude towards white women than I had expected. There was still the occasional manifestation of stereotypes I did not appreciate, but I never felt like I was going to need mace to defend my virtue on the way to the grocery store. One morning, when I was wandering through the Biente de Novembre market in Oaxaca, I lagged behind the rest of my family. I was staring at huge baskets full of spindly dried grasshoppers, heaps of dark maroon peppers piled higher than my head, and delicately embroidered white cotton shirts when I felt someone jab me in the back. Thinking it was my younger brother, I just rolled my eyes, ignored the poke and inspected the grasshoppers more closely, wondering if I could convince my mom to buy some. Then I felt someone step on the backs of my shoes. I was about to tell my brother to leave me alone when someone who was definitely not my little brother grabbed my hips and started groping me. For a second I couldn’t move. Then I whirled around and stared at a Mexican man, who was swaying slightly and obviously drunk. He stood there – just staring at me, completely unabashed. None of the vendors or shoppers near me said or did anything. After all, who could blame him? I was obviously such a tempting seductress in my boy shorts and chunky glasses; it wasn’t his fault he was drawn into my thrall.
Last year I traveled all over the world, and, being my very flawed and tactless self, I made a lot of mistakes. But if I could change just one thing I did that entire year, I would change how I reacted to that pathetic excuse for a man. If I could travel back in time I would give him two black eyes: one for me and one for the girl he grabbed after I got away from him, which I did as soon as I came to my senses. I sprinted towards the exit feeling dirty and nauseous, trying to blend into the crowd. As I made my way towards the street the man followed, past the hunks of raw meat, clusters of piñatas, cases of Oaxacan chocolate, and masses of cheap plastic toys. Even though he was bigger and stronger than I was, he was drunk and I was powered by adrenaline. Finally, I lost him in the crowd near the entrance, where I found my mom, who had no idea why I was running so fast and looking over my shoulder so often. After that it was awhile before I got within arm’s reach of any male not in my immediate family, and I glared suspiciously at any man who came anywhere near me for days. I was scared, confused, and guilty.
But not anymore. I would like to make one thing perfectly clear. I am not a whore. Don’t treat me like one. I’m done running, I’m done hiding, and I’m done keeping my mouth shut and my head down.  I’m done being horrified, I’m done being humiliated, and I’m done making allowances. If you treat me like a whore, I will personally make sure you are castrated.
These words – my words – are my revenge. Though you have taunted me, terrified me, and brought me to tears, I have documented your faults, broadcasted your brutality, and immortalized your sins. You have become the villains, the nameless incarnations of the worst of humanity, the lurking shadows that are always defeated in the end of the story so everyone else can live happily ever after. The pen is mightier than the sword, this is my story, and I have won.