villa luna: why do they do that?

why do they do that?

a week ago i joined a bunch of girlfriends (no husbands or boyfriends) for drinks at a friend's house and then to a club to go dancing (oh my knees hurt!). i go out dancing maybe once every 2 years or so - and then usually only when forced. it's not that i don't like to dance - i'm happy to dance when i'm home alone and listening to music.

of course, a bunch of women, especially foreigners, attracted a lot of attention from the local men. we did our best to ignore them but... they really made it impossible. while dancing i felt a guy's hand on my ass. i caught it and turned his hand backwards as i turned around to see who it was attached to. he thought he was funny and tried to kiss me. i pushed him away. he tried again. i pushed him a little harder. all the while, two other guys were standing just a little ways behind him, laughing. i'm not sure if they were laughing at him or me. in retrospect, i can't believe they did nothing to help.

then he grabbed me and tried again to kiss me. i raised my fist into his face - like i was going to hit him! i can't believe i did that. everything else was ok but not threatening to punch him. and what was i going to do if he hit me back???? i am not a violent person!!! i don't talk about violence. i don't watch it. i don't use it. until that night - when i threatened to punch a guy. i am going to have to think about that. on the funny side. i am taller than most of the people in this country so i was looking down at him.

interestingly, when i told other foreigners, they mostly laughed. when i told turks, men and women alike said i did exactly the right thing, or maybe not even enough (although one turkish man told me we were asking for harassment for not having even one man with our group!). every single woman said i should have kicked him in the whatchamacallits. err... that's even less likely than me actually punching someone.

all i can say is, i love turkey and i generally find people here to be very friendly and respectful. but this kind of stuff happens too often. what is it with turkish men that says, "be an ass. be way too aggressive. it'll get you women"?

sigh. so it'll probably be another couple of years before i go dancing at a club.

Posted at 01:52 AM in istanbul | Permalink

Comments

Hi, I am sorry to hear about your experience! What a shame. I think it has a lot do with you being a foreigner. Some Turkish men think that foreign women are easy to enchant. I think this also has to do with how the media portrays foreign women: they are seen as shameless and free to do anything, anywhere, anytime. I am not sure what the short-term solution is. However, hopefully in a very very longtime as Turkish men and media get used to the presence of foreign women we see the difference.
I am hopeful because of something I experienced here in the US: a Turkish friend of mine (male) could not stop staring the bare legs of young women jogging around the campus. He is an educated, married, successful young man but could not stop it. After a couple of years I realized that he stopped doing it. When we talked about it he said that he got used to seen these women. We can only hope the same thing for those Turkish men who were like the one you encountered last night.

Posted by: Zeynep | October 04, 2009 at 12:20 AM