oNE tHReaD oF thE paSt

when most people hear that i've lived in the middle east all my life, their eyes kind of pop out.... you know go wide and do an :O
no its not cool. i hated it there. more so coz i was a girl. girls don't exactly have the run of the land. well if memory serves me right, no one had the run of the land, except the locals....

but worse was the vast community of ... you know those ppl who came from your homeland to be the blue collar labour class. man they really scared me sometimes...

no no you can't tear at me for generalizing my bias against blue color workers in the middle east. most were from kerala.... ofcourse not ALL prob were... how would i know..
but after being groped, eve teased and scared shitless countless times, i think i have the authority to say.... that strangers scare me. and all blue color workers do.

it's my legacy from the middle east. a running vein of cowardice in my backbone.

it's not like parents don't try to protect the kids.
"get home before dark"
"no going alone anywhere more than 100 feet from the house"
"no playing outside without adult supervision"
"no going to some person's house to learn piano"
"no, you can't go to the supermarket by yourself to get a coke"

it's not like only girls have to watch out....

shrug. well that was life as we knew it. just keep a sharp eye out... unfortunately did i mention i got really bad instincts??
and poor reflexes to boot. most times i'd just be stupified that something so dumb could happen.
i had this friend. my neighbour. she was pretty i guess. the four of us would play outside everyday. me, my brother , she and her brother.
twice this older teenager local guy tried to drag her away. when we were coming back home.... both times we were saved by our parents coming out looking for us.

yeah yeah i'm brooding. i know.

there was this one picnic i went to. was i 8? 10? i don't remember. a bunch of us had gone in this big bus to a nearby park. and everyone got off to play in the park. for some reason i wanted to come back.. oh yeah i wanted a hairband or water bottle or something.
so i come back, and this bus driver and his friend are in the bus.

it's unfortunate that when i'm left to my own devices, i invariable act stupider than normal.

well he asked me something. something really harmless. and guileless idiot chatterbox that i am, we struck up a conversation. now there wasn't anything sinister about that. i spoke for 5 minutes. all ^_^ and happy. and then i wanted to get off. the bus i mean. well it was at that point i realized i was boxed in and he wouldn't let me go. and when i say wouldn't, he simply blocked my way and was laughing. i looked out the window and wondered if i should scream.

ppl were far away. and making a lot of noise. i really doubted anyone would hear me. i was still smiling, coz i didn't really want to show i was worried.
u know if i remember it right i even considered jumping out the window. heck, what was a broken leg compared to anything else....

well finally i didn't have to do anything drastic. he was only blocking the middle aisle of the bus, so i simply jumped over the seats. unfortunately he thought it would be funny to hold my ankle and not let go. well i did the only thing i could. kicked him hard and jumped out the bus. i swore up and down and over all the gods i wasn't getting back in the bus.
so on the way back home, i insisted that i'd ride back in some random family's car.

ofcourse the fuckall bastard had the gall to grin at me, watching me all the while and when i'm about to leave. as in the car is about to leave, he walks up. cool as you please, tells me to roll down the window.
[ i was sitting alone in the locked car, while the rest of the ppl were a lil away and distracted ]
well what do i do? idiot that i am, i roll down the window, [ well he couldn't really do anything at that point ] and he has the balls to ask me for my phone number. [ for god's sake we didn't have cell phones back then. i don't think it was invented yet ]
ofCOURSE i'm dumbstruck. i shake my head unable to believe the guy and say i don't have a phone and after doing that twice i roll up the window fed up with the whole thing.

sigh.

being a kid in the middle east wasn't a piece of cake. being a girl, even more so.

well. everyone's got a story don't they?
and mebe i can't come up with a funny one everyday. now can i ?

hey, boob guy, were you the same guy who questioned the authenticity of the posts???
it's up to you. you know. it can be whatever you want it to be.

fact?

fiction?

shrug. do you really think i care, what you believe.

[ btw u guys should really pick fake names. like dear ol' granpa cacafonix. if you want you can take multiple names. i don't care... ]


River flows in you - instrumental
and no i didn't want to put that video here. but if you got 4 minutes, you can listen to it.