Spiked Rod

2017

No one has ever experienced what my father put me through.
It’s such a difficult thing to live through,
When you’re a kid in first grade,
And your father takes you home from school,
And beats you with a spiked rod,
Nails penetrating your entire body.
It was a long walk home,
And I was being beaten up continuously,
blood gushing out of the wounds.
All of this for something I didn’t do.
Something that wasn’t my fault.

FULL STORY

Androphobia

2019

He molested a girl in second grade.
I didn’t understand and couldn’t fathom what was happening.
I only knew that I was very mad.
But I didn’t say anything.
He was my English teacher.

FULL STORY

The Bravest Man

2015

I just couldn’t wait to grow up to be a man.
Whenever I’d see women waiting in line in front of the kiosk,
I’d go press myself up against their bodies.
The most any of them would do was just walk away.

FULL STORY

Saw Me and Walked Away

2015

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.

FULL STORY

They circled Him

2015

When I was in the eighth grade, there was a boy with me at school who was blond and fair-skinned. He was a grade younger than I was.
Wherever he went, the other students would harass him. He was absent a lot because of this. His father came in to complain more than once but to no avail.

FULL STORY

Baba's Place Is a Prison

2015

Why does everything bad happen only to me?
I weighed myself yesterday.
I’m gaining, not losing, weight.
I’m depressed.
My body’s a mess.
I need to change.

FULL STORY

The Hair Plucker

2015

I know how to tweeze and thread.
I'm an employee by day, but I do these things at night.
The troll I'm married to sits at home all day and doesn't make a penny to spend on the kids, and he gives me a beating every other day or so.

FULL STORY

Inside a circle of men

2014

When I was in middle school, I went to a school in Al Mandara, and there was a girls' school across the street from ours. We used to finish school at the same time.

FULL STORY

The First Time a Boy Touched Me

2018

I was in the third grade and we took the same bus to school.
He was fair-skinned and had rosy cheeks.
He had thick, soft, jet black hair.
He had thick eyebrows and piercing eyes.
He was the class and bus clown.
He was that kid who joked around all the time.
I loved him.
romantic relationships, school

FULL STORY

The Religion Teacher

2016

Mr. Khairy asked me to come sit with you for a bit.
Who asked Mr. Khairy about the [Quranic] verse
that speaks of the Guarding of private parts?
Who?!

FULL STORY
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