Gender ReflectionsNov 28, 2006
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| (MK) On the overnight sleeper train to Chakki Bank Mike and I were having a lovely conversation with two kids and their Dad when this guy just appeared. The others left, Mike was on the other side of the car reading and I was looking out the window. The guy just kept staring at me. Then he walked over and picked up my book. Brimming with Canadian politeness I asked him if he had read it. Then he asked me something about my necklace and reached out to touch it. Then he asked me where my shirt was made and touched that. Each time he was greasily staring at my boobs and definitely making me feel uncomfortable. It was clearly spiraling in a somewhat awkward direction and I was wondering whether I should start making a scene or move seats. How do I, chained in by my nation's politeness deal with this obvious affront? It all got diffused by Mike who asked if I needed help. The guy realized I wasn't on my own, picked up my pen, told me it was made in India (actually Japan but there you go) and walked out. My first Indian man groping. It made me feel angry and it really stuck with me, I kept thinking what is the right thing to have done? Over the last while I have chatted to many women who are traveling in India on their own and with friends. The more Western female travelers I talk to, the more stories like this I hear. Especially women traveling on their own, they have reported being followed and feeling quite intimidated. The pace and attitudes are so different over here. It is hard for me with my good suffragette roots and encouragement during my upbringing to be a strong, independent woman to be a subservient female but there is a different expectation. I am doing my best and am wearing long skirts and keeping my cleavage tucked away behind a shawl but I don't like feeling inferior. It is hard because women are viewed so differently - they are owned here,and in many regions are considered nothing without their husbands. The tradition is that if a woman's husband dies she might as well throw herself on the funeral pyre because her life is over. She can not re-marry and her husband's family might well throw her out on the street. In some of the cities this is no longer the norm and times are changing but drive a few miles into the country and that India is still very much alive and well. Western women are viewed by some as pretty much the same as prostitutes. Because our society is comfortable with sex, some Indian men seem to view western women as "fair game". Ih ave been somewhat struggling with how to deal with this. Following my time at Tushita I seem to have emerged as a somewhat "reset" person. The stresses that had been getting to me prior to Tushita seem to have been worked out to some degree. On the Indian man front there has been an incredible shift in me. I am back to the MKG I know. I am not sure why I found it so hard at the beginning but I am no longer feeling intimidated by the staring. I am in a "give as good as I get" sort of place and this has meant that then men here are treating me differently. They no longer only address Mike or rather if they do I make them address me as well. I no longer feel like I have to change who I am to fit in here, instead I feel like I have to be respectful of the customs and traditions but that if I project myself as unafraid and invincible that is what I will be. The funny thing is it is really working. I walked through the bustling bazaar in Jaipur today. I was on my own and surrounded by men. They were sometimes aggressively trying to get me to buy things. I was the only Western women surrounded by at times 20 Indian men. I started having fun with it. I joked with them. Bantered, bartered and barked. They laughed along and I enjoyed myself and they were totally respectful. I bought a drum and played it with some kids on the way back to the guesthouse. On the rickshaw on the way home the driver tried to force my to go somewhere that I didn't want to (to look at a shop that his friend had). They were taking advantage of the fact that I was a woman alone. I gave them hell, started getting out of the rickshaw and really started making a fuss. The driver apologized, and took me home. I joked with him about it later. I am realizing this is all just a game. You have to play the game and make it clear what you will or will not put up with yet stay respectful. I think I have found the balance and I feel quite different now. I have met some phenomenally lovely men here and like everywhere there are good and bad people around but it is an unfortunate truth that as a woman traveling here you have to be prepared to shoot from the hip and make your boundaries razor sharp clear. |
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