The Other side ...

My last blog was a reminiscence of my experience of living alone in Chennai, the positive side of course. However, with every positive experience comes along certain risks, cetain fears and a lot of responsibility. And in this, I plan to write about just that - the other side. I hope sharing my experiences would be of some help to all you girls out there. From being followed on the road, to being molested, it has also been a scary experience living here.

A few days back I had a very disturbing experience of being molested when I was travelling on my cycle. And no, it was not late in the night, was sometime around 9:00 pm when this happened. Needless to say, I was shocked by this and I screamed ... literally for my life. I lost my balance and fell down on the road. Sensing danger, the guy sped away. Thankfully, my scream and my fall alarmed the passersby and they managed to catch him, he had to bear the brunt of the public, rage and fury of girls who have had similar experiences before in their lives. The police was fetched and he was handed over. I felt happy and relieved that I had the public support.

However, not everyone is as lucky as I have been so, here are few things that all the girls should pay heed to:

1. Try not to venture out late night, if you must, always have a group around and wear shoes that you can run in
2. Always choose a crowded area to travel and avoid narrow, secluded lanes
3. A friend suggested that we must always carry a weapon - a pepper spray, a knife ... anything that you may find handy
4. Always carry a jacket or a scarf in your bag when you are stylishly dressed for a party. Use them while you are on your way back so that you do not end up attracting unwanted attention
5. Trust your instinct - we girls have something called sixth sense. Use it ... say no to outdoor plans with friends' friends ... facebook friends ... or friends you do not trust cent percent.
6. Never accept a drink from anyone, always make your own drinks
7. Never take an auto / taxi to your place, always get down when you are at a distance from your residence
8. If you are travelling alone in a taxi late in the night try talking to a friend. The idea is to let the driver know that someone is aware of where you are and how you are travelling and make sure you note down the vehicle number while getting into it
9. Try and avoid ordering food from outside if you are living alone. The point is to avoid outsiders from knowing where you live
10. Create a tamasha. God forbid, but if someone misbehaves with you, just scream ... raise an alarm, get people's attention. Lot of times, we face this in crowded buses, if you are the victim, do not just keep quite, shout ...its ok to hurl abuses, remember ... NOBODY CAN TOUCH YOU WITHOUT YOUR PERMISSION AND IF ONE DOES, MAKE SURE HE PAYS FOR IT

So all the girls out there, take care and stay very very safe ...