There used to be a rumor about me going on in the Bengali community of Munich. “Charu changes her boyfriends like her underwear!” I’d walk in the streets with any male classmate of mine and boom! I have a new boyfriend! Being an 18 year old divorcée all by myself in a foreign land apparently made me a slut! 18 more years have passed since then.
Well, I don’t change my underwear every three years 😂. And even if I do, none of your business.
In my early twenties, when I had more energy and stamina, I’d regularly go out on the weekends. I remember, I used to hangout a lot in the elite club P1 with my friends. All the celebrities and specially the Bayern Munich players would frequently visit that club. We met Bastian Schwansteiger, Oliver Kahn, Arjen Roben… and some more I don’t remember now. One glass of coke would cost 20€ there, so we used to bring drinks from home and hide them in the bushes outside and would order exactly one glass of coke. Every once in a while we’d get out of the club and behave like spoiled little brats of some millionaire parents (yeah, like Blair Waldorf or Serena van der Woodsen) and take a walk towards the bushes to fetch our drinks. Stealthy 🥷 🙈. We actually went to P1 just to check out the cars … A Ferrari was the cheapest one amongst them 😏.
One Saturday night, pretending to be the usual spoiled brat in P1, I noticed a guy checking me out. It felt like as if he was licking me through his eyes. I came back home with a very impure feeling and had to take a shower.
At some point, I switched to a gothic slash Tom boy style. I’d wear baggies, loose hoodies and tees, got a tattoo and a piercing, got a leather bracelet around my carpal … my hair was always short, but now I’ve got a pixie cut. People started to call me a lesbian 🙄… and also started to harass me accordingly.
I remember once when I was visiting Dhaka. I went to Gawsia Market with my cousin. We were walking in a long queue of women spiraling down the narrow streets full of apparel stores. I was wearing a pair of jeans, a long shirt and a dopatta. Suddenly I felt a hand in between my Butt chicks 😳. I looked behind me, I saw just a woman, walking like me, clasping her both hands on her dear breasts. I looked sideways, literally no one! I couldn’t see whoever was groping me. Then I just grabbed that hand on my butt and pulled it with all my might in front of me… কান টানলে মাথা আসে! It was a Cooli, who was walking beside the queue balancing his load on his head with one hand and with the other he was groping my butt to achieve, heaven knows, what kind of pleasure he wanted to achieve! I immediately pushed him and started to curse. The other ladies joined in. 😌
Bottom line! I am an independent, self sufficient and self reliant woman! So whatever I wear, it’s just a piece of fabric! Whoever I date, is my choice! No one has any right to judge me, or harass me, or spread rumors about me. If I’m wearing shorts in summer, or wearing a head scarf in a mosque, no one gets the right to even imagine that they can put their hands on me! And claiming that I was simply asking to be groped just because I was wearing pants or skirts or whatever? This is bullsh**. Don’t get me wrong, I still wear whatever I see fit according to the occasion and weather. Be it an LBD or a par of Uggs. It’s just… whatever I decide to wear, the society will always put a finger on me.
Verbal harassment or spreading rumors about single Bengali women in foreign countries is a regular practice. This is no way a lesser assault than physical molestation IMHO. I haven’t even started to talk about the psychological trauma it causes.
I wasn’t asking for it! It is as simple as that.
