Big day today for the women of Australia (15 March 2021). While I didn't attend a protest, I wrote about my experience of ... situations where I've wondered if I'll survive. I'm sure we all have them. Love to hear your stories, if you have them...
It’s a sunny Saturday afternoon and I have left my share house in West London. I am heading out for a walk along the River Thames across the bridge and back along the waterfront. I have my Walkman in my pocket, headphones in my ears and a mix-tape playing 90s grunge in my ears.
Just as I reach an isolated, bushy area by the river, happy to be alone in nature with girl grunge band L7 singing ‘Pretend we’re dead’ in my ears, a cyclist whips by. He raises up from his seat as he passes me, like he is about to speed up and off into the distance. Instead, he pulls his track pants down and moons me, the whites of his buttocks only inches away as he passes by. He looks back at me laughing, as he gauges my reaction.
I stick my middle finger up at him, shaking my head, trying to act nonchalant, but my stomach is suddenly on red alert. How long has he been behind me? Has he been watching me? Staring at my arse and legs? Then – even more concerning – he disappears into the bush. I turn my Walkman off and keep the buds in my ears, trying to be cool, like everything is normal – it seems important – and pick up the pace. When I get to the area where he took off down a track, I glance into the bush. He is standing in a clearing next to his bike, pants down, pulling on his penis. He is watching me watching him. He wants me to see him masturbating.
‘Sicko!’ I yell at him and start to run. I need to get to a more populated area – and fast. I can’t stop thinking about the newspapers, which over the last week have been filled with the face of the beautiful blonde 23-year-old woman who was sexually assaulted and stabbed to death on Wimbledon Common. When she was found, the newspapers said her two-year-old son was clinging to her saying, ‘Wake up Mummy, wake up’.
They still haven’t arrested anyone for her murder. My chest tightens and the hairs on the back of my neck prickle… I feel sick. I want to run faster, but I am tired. I pace myself again, look behind myself constantly until the bridge comes into view. I know I will be safe if I just reach the bridge, which I know will be populated with traffic and people crossing on foot. Then Hammersmith Bridge looms into view…
I am lucky. I made it home.
I am travelling in eastern Turkey with my old friend Mark, a big guy, over six-foot. We have just had dinner and are walking home from a restaurant. There are no women on the streets in eastern Turkey. You can arrive in a small town on a smoky bus full of men, badly needing the toilet. There’s a queue outside the men’s toilet. You get to the women’s, and it is locked. There is no need for it. Women don’t leave the home. Especially not at night. It is almost dark. We’re a block away from our hotel. I am wearing black leggings and a long black jumper to mid thighs, with a denim jacket over top and hiking boots. I have a black and white checked headband on, but my hair is not covered. A group of young men come around the corner heading towards us. They are talking and laughing when they see us. As they pass by, one of them curls up his fist and punches me hard in the stomach. I scream out loud, ‘You fucker!’ Mark grabs me and covers my mouth, dragging me up the street.
‘Sorry,’ he says, as we lock the hotel door behind us. ‘I had to make it look like you were being controlled! Otherwise they might’ve retaliated – all of them together. It could’ve been much worse!’ And I know he was right. Perhaps he saved my life.
I am lucky. I made it home.
We are in another town in eastern Turkey, in Kurdistan. It is early morning and we have no food. Mark wants to sleep. I want to eat. Mark has been backpacking for a long time now, and it is new for me. He only needs one meal a day. He is way skinnier than he was when we shared a house in Melbourne. There is a bakery up the road – I saw it when we arrived. I figure it’ll be OK to slip out and buy some bread. It’s 8am. Surely I’ll be safe? My hunger gets the better of me and I take off. I don’t take the key, thinking the automatic doors will open in the foyer and Mark will let me into our room on the first floor.
Our concrete hotel is in a small town-square, and as I return, bread in hand, I notice there are men streaming into the square – some sort of gathering is happening. I move quickly towards the hotel, noticing men noticing me. I get to the sliding glass doors, the ones I expect to open automatically. They don’t. I pace backwards and forwards, willing the doors to open. They don’t. I knock, trying not to draw attention from the crowd. An older man moves towards me. He speaks English. He is concerned for me, he says. I explain the situation. I say, ‘My husband is in our room on the first floor.’ It wouldn’t do to say, my male friend.
‘What is his name?’ says the man. ‘Mark.’ He starts yelling out ‘Mark, Mark’, as I bang on the front door. Men are staring, but they don’t intervene. Thank god for this stranger – my protector. Eventually Mark comes to the window. He has been asleep. He comes down and opens the glass doors.
I am lucky, I made it home.
I am running through the grounds at the University of Tasmania. It is early morning, maybe 7am… The sky is blue, the air is crisp, the trees are turning red-brown and losing their leaves, there is no one around. I leave the campus and head down a side street. Mount Wellington looms in the distance. As I pace myself, knowing I am only halfway on my run, I notice a moving object in the distance. As I get closer, I see long straggly white hair, and I think, ‘Ah, an old woman’. She moves from the sidewalk out into the middle of the empty street, where I am running. I slow down. She must want directions. But by the time I make out her features clearly, I see I’ve made a mistake. It is a man. A dishevelled, wrinkled man with wild eyes and a stale, unwashed stench. He grabs me by the shoulders and shoves his face into mine.
‘Where do you think you’re going?!’ he snarls. I scream and thrust my arms against his to break his hold. He takes a step back, and then he is punching, a left hook to my jaw. I stagger and take off – I am running again. Running away. I don’t go straight home; I continue on my regular path – routine seems important. But when I reach home – a shared house just off campus – my housemates are waking. Carolyn is coming down the stairs. She looks at me curiously, and says, ‘Are you OK?’ The tears then come … and I tell her what happened. She points out that my jaw is swollen. Shock gives way to emotion…
‘You need to go to the police and report this,’ she says. ‘ Who knows what he’ll do next?’
The local police know who I am talking about when I describe him. They say he’s an old Vietnam War veteran.
‘Gone troppo’, they say, and do I want to press charges? I say no. I just wanted to make a statement, to let them know. I actually feel sorry for him.
I tell myself my scream shocked him as much as he shocked me, which caused him to punch. I make excuses for him.
I am lucky, I made it home.
For all the women who didn’t.
RIP.
