The French teacher, Miss Lubnah, was very sweet and petite.
She spoke in broken Arabic,
But her French was perfect.
She was a great French teacher.

I was pushed against a wall, then I was pushed and shoved some more until I found myself inside a clothes shop on Talaat Harb Street. The attacks were random but very aggressive. I could hear gunshots.

I was on a minibus.
From the window, I saw a girl running along the corniche.
She had her headphones on.
It was 5 in the evening,
And three men were running after her.
I saw them reach out to grope her.

The streets were empty, and I was walking down a main street lined with security cameras. A car stopped next to me, and I was pulled inside.
There was an attempt to assault me. There wasn’t just one person inside the car.
I resisted and raised my voice and screamed. They threw me out of the car five minutes later.
gender violence, sexual violence, mass sexual assault

I spot one of the harassers.
I pull myself up, leaning against a railing for support, and head towards him.
I look at him, and in his eyes I see...
Nothing.
Nothing!

As soon as the bell rang,
The boys locked the door.
I was in the neighboring classroom when it happened.
They locked the doors and windows.
They assaulted her and sexually harassed her,
Completely tearing apart her clothes.

I was walking past an qahwa (local cafe).
I could see them trying to form a circle around me.
No one from the qahwa did anything to stop them.
I don’t know where that scream came from, but it made them leave.

We were in middle school.
It wasn’t a very good school—Omar el-Khattab School.
Sadly, it never lived up to its name.
A third grade teacher was molested in class.
Everyone heard about the incident.
She saw some students masturbating in class,
gender violence, sexual violence, harassment, mass sexual assault, sex, school, sex education

One day they brought bang snaps to school,
And they threw it at Mrs. Cherine while she was writing on the board.
She was startled and when she turned around
Two or three boys got up, closed the door, turned off the lights,

I heard a girl scream as I ran towards the crowd.
I started pulling people out of the way, trying to reach her, but I was shoved out of the circle of men surrounding her every single time.