I found out what harassment was when I was in sixth grade.
I’ll never forget that day.
I’ll never forget what he looked like.
It was in the morning and the streets were relatively empty.
He was moving behind me on a bike.
I suddenly felt his hand on my body.
gender violence, harassment, the street

There was a guy in a red car,
Who kept slowing down for me.
He kept saying something,
But I can’t bring myself to say it out loud.
All I can say is that it was about a specific part of my back.

As I was leaving Hijr-Ismail—it can get really crowded there—I felt someone shove their hand between my legs and grope me.
I immediately spun around and started punching the man behind me.
“In front of the Holy Kaaba, you kaafir?!” I screamed.

I came nowhere near you.
So, did he stand you up?
Yes, you. There’s no one else here, is there?
I’m here if he doesn’t show up, you know.

I was going home after practice dressed in sports clothes.
Two men were checking me out in the street:
“Is that a girl or a boy?”
“It’s a girl, man.”

I stopped going to school at that time.
I didn’t know what harassment was, but there was a rape incident being talked about on TV.
I thought he had raped me.
When I finally found the courage to start going out again, I would hide behind other women in the street.

When I first started wearing those pants,
The way people looked at me changed.

I was wearing a headscarf and a long, roomy skirt.
I was walking down the sidewalk,
By the walls of the university.
Soldier-like.
At 2 in the afternoon.
I heard someone walking behind me, moaning.

I was waiting for the tram,
When I saw them coming towards me,
And calling two others from behind.

My father was the first person to touch me.
I used to tell myself that I was imagining it.
When he’d touch me with his leg from behind,
I’d tell myself he was just being playful.