The first time I was molested,
Or the first time I realized that someone had molested me,
I was a 7 year old child.
He was an old man.
I was on the beach, and he took advantage of me being alone,
While my parents were away,
So he touched me.
gender violence, sexual violence, child molestation, parents, suicide

“When do you plan on getting married?” my father, aunts, uncles, and cousins always ask me.
Or if we’re at a wedding, they always say ou’balik [may you be next].
I wonder how the elders of the family would react if I walked around at funerals and poked them, saying “Ou’balik!”

One of my friends was interested in me.
He wanted to do certain things with me.
masculinity, parents, social pressure

Because she wanted her own place.
She wanted to live.
That’s what a marriage contract was to her: freedom.

"How’s your love life?” she asked.
I forced a laugh.
The question embarrassed me.
She insisted that I was a romantic and that apparently my whole family were romantics.
"You know,” she began, “if you want to get married, I could bring you a lot of suitors to meet.”

You’re the ones who said it was better for me to attend an all girls’ school.
You told me to completely avoid anyone with short hair, and I did!
No clubs, no trips, no talking to any male relatives.
No going to places that could present any opportunity to interact with the male species.

Normally, no one attended classes, but everyone showed up for this one: the lesson on reproduction.
The classroom was packed.
Students from other classes even joined our class for the lesson.
Apparently some boys made it their mission to attend every one of these lessons.

I was molested by my father when I was a child.

I was around 12 years old.
Our relatives were visiting on the day I got my first period.
I hid in the bathroom.
I was too scared to come out.
I didn’t know what to tell them.
My mother then called for me.
She came in and hugged me.
She told me it was a normal thing.

I am a mother now.
I didn’t realize how tired I’d be.
I didn’t know what the fear would be like.
Because mothers get scared.
When I was a child,
I didn’t know how scared my mother would get,
When dealing with a situation.
Or that she did certain things out of fear.
The kind of fear mothers experience is present 24/7.