C'est La Vie

I wrote this Jul 31 2014 and never posted it.  I should have posted it, this is why I write... to document my life, express my feelings properly and without censoring.  I feel bad that I didn't post this so.. here we go.  It's so interesting to me to realize that small changes have occurred.  I suppose I'll write another blog post soon.

I've always been a self proclaimed "extremist" (see HERE) but even I have grown tired of the roller coaster of emotions that I go through.

I'm tired.  I always have my eyes on the people close to me.  I'm always like "are they ok, are their feelings hurt, are they tired, are they stressed, did I go too far in pushing them to do something productive, am I hurting their ego, should I be more caring versus tough love, should I be more disconnected and let them figure their own thing out, did I act too upset (even if I feel upset) and do they now know that I'm upset but I don't want them to feel like they upset me because then they'll feel bad and I don't want them to feel bad because I know they mean well or they didn't mean to hurt me"... I'm just always so concerned with having everyone around me be ok and be good, and of course that's just trying it's not always successful but I am very mindful of other people's feelings (of those close to me).

I may not need anything from anyone but it's just that sometimes I get really tired.  Like today, I'm tired.  I'm stressed, I've tried to do what I do every day and be happy and chill and be positive and not dwell... like I'm REALLY good now at just being like "No Sharin, you have to be happy" and switch off and find happiness somewhere.  I CHOOSE to be happy but sometimes you want to be able to just lie on someone's chest and have them stroke your hair while actually UNDERSTANDING you.

I've grown used to being alone.  I occupy my time with work, books, TV, magazines, and hanging out with friends as much as I can.  And then laughably I actually get random calls from people sometimes who tell me stuff like "you're actually a nice girl, I know people talk shit about you but you're actually nice".. like what??..1. people still talk about me, and 2. they have ill things to say? how confusing!  If only they knew I spent the last weekend re-reading Harry Potter 6 and 7 ;).

Whether it's in a funny YouTube video or reading a tabloid magazine to distract me, I've learnt to depend on myself and only myself to be my friend.   I watch movies by myself, I have eaten in restaurants alone, I can go somewhere alone after work and sit for a bit, at this point I can't even visualize myself travelling the world with anyone.  I would have to go alone.  There's always going to be someone who says "oh everybody does that it's not a big deal".  It's not.  It's not a big deal.  I'm just saying a lot of people have that person that they can discuss their shitty or good day with or talk about a coworker or talk about the person in front of them in line or talk about their dreams or talk about their failures or talk about whatever.  Even now even though I'm a little down I know I have NO right to be down, I personally know someone who is dealing with so much and in the most painful way and she's so strong about it outwardly that I feel no right to even write this blog post.  I never feel like I have the right to b*tch about something.  I'm always apologizing to myself, to others about how I feel or what I'm thinking.. or thinking that I don't have the right to feel a certain way.  Again, it's tiring, I'm tired.

I do have to say that my mother is my greatest source of comfort and pure love.  Although she is usually the person that I argue with the most and I often get the emotional backlash of her frustrations (that are always totally warranted), she is the person who has my back for 99.9% of situations lol (the other 0.1 percent being my desire to be a vagabond drunk hippie flower artist living in Mumbai).

I just feel like I can't leave until I know everyone is going to be ok.  I need to know that everyone I care about will be ok.

How messed up are people these days?

I recently heard of Sabina Altynbekova (I'll wait while you go Google her since I know that's what you're doing right now)... a 17 year old Volleyball player who has recently been proclaimed "too hot" for Volleyball.

She's from Kazakhstan, went to Taiwan to play Volleyball with her team and instead of being appreciated for her skills; she's now an Anime character, has multiple Facebook pages and profiles devoted to her, has been offered modelling contracts and is international news.  She's SEVENTEEN FREAKING YEARS OLD.  Seriously, you go to watch a Volleyball game and instead become infatuated by a high school child????????  You're a sicko!

This is just so bizarre.  Not that this would EVER happen to me but I'm sure if this ever happened to me I would be 1.) Flattered beyond f*ck and then 2.) Extremely mortified by the level of attention and wished I could crawl into a hole because my parents would be like.. wtf is wrong with the world.

It's kind of like when you go out dressed casually with your Dad and a bunch of creeps stare at you!  It's awkward as hell, your Dad gets mad, you FEEL LIKE IT'S YOUR FAULT even though it's not.

You know, this girl is beautiful(!!!)... she's so beautiful that she deserves a modelling contract, international fame, anime characters based off of her and millions of fans.  Do you know what else she deserves?  She deserves to be able to pursue an education/a degree, athletics, a normal life, other ambitions that she may have without feeling pressured to accept this "once in a lifetime opportunity of becoming a model".  You can be beautiful and still have a life without feeling the pressure to succumb to what society dictates you should be simply because you are aesthetically pleasing.
***EDIT***
Ok - I have to add - I saw a "Sourcefed" video on YouTube which is how I came to know of this, clicked on another YouTube video to see what the deal was and then laughed my butt off at the amount of deluded people in the world!

Seriously, people are so confused.  Most people are commenting about how she's an Asian supermodel in the making and are curious as to why people are commenting saying "mash'Allah" in the comments!!!!!  Seriously do you not realize that 1.) Kazakhstan IS IN ASIA 2.)  She is likely Muslim as Kazakhstan is a predominately Muslim country.  ???  Again, people are messed UP!

I'm writing this post 46 seconds into watching this YouTube video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1dzgqXjhTA8

I'm crying (big surprise I'm the most emotional crier I know).  I have been in more situations than I would like to mention, in horrid and truly terrifying moments where I thought - this is it, I'm going to be raped, this is the end, this person is going to kill me.

I am not exaggerating.  These are the thoughts that run through a woman's head when she is out, when she is alone, when someone looks at her the wrong way, when someone leers at her, when she's had a few drinks, when she realizes that any man who wants to can overpower her, when she's in a cab and the cab driver makes a turn she wasn't expecting, when her phone battery is dead and she's out, when she gets lost, when she goes on a date with someone who she wasn't too sure with, when she's in a public bathroom that doesn't have anyone else in it and she hears the door open, when she's on the Skytrain and someone won't leave her alone, when she gets off at a bus stop and someone who was staring at her gets off the same stop, when she hears someone running behind her and she's on a street walking and the sun has set and no one is around, when she's in a parking lot walking to her car and the only other person is a male and he's walking close to you, when you're at a party and someone keeps pressuring you to walk with them or go somewhere with them, when someone you know is supposed to "drop you off" but are ambling around and giving you really creepy vibes, when you're at a college party and someone is dropping you off at your dorm, when you're on a camping trip and someone is walking you to your tent under a guise of being nice and helpful but you don't really trust them, when you have to ask someone else to come along with you, when you are travelling in a foreign country and you're trying to book a room somewhere, when you're on a Vegas trip with your friends and you have to call security because someone you met casually just won't stop banging down your door and terrifying your friends after you told them no.  Whew.


There are a myriad of situations in which a woman will have that one blinking second (or more) of pure fear, of pure terror, of the thought of being raped.

It is, I believe, every Woman's worse fear.  The act of rape, is a terrifying and very real fear for women.  It's not something like being kidnapped where you think, this only happens to other people.  It's one of those fears that is VERY REAL, it's very present in a woman's life.  There have been multiple "What would you do" type of situations in which a drunken girl in America has been at a bar and a man she clearly doesn't know tries to pick her up.  Watch: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6QcLs98NeJY


 I remember watching that video with my Father no less and tearing up so badly at 2:30.  It is shocking to me to see people do nothing.  That man is a hero in my eyes, he is someone I will never forget.  "She don't walk this freaking place with you because she don't know you".   Word!  Thank you humanity!!!!!!  If you did not cry at 3:04 I don't even want to know you, straight up.

It is heartening to me when people, complete strangers, have come to my aid.  I have walked up to complete strangers and said "hey, this man has been taking pictures of me while I'm standing here, I don't know him, please help me".  Can you imagine?  Literally I have had males that I don't even know block me from being snapped.  My new tactic is to flip my phone to "selfie" mode, turn it around to face the offender and have them see themselves being perverts.  It's actually quite effective (but scary if they get angry).

I have walked up to Skytrain officials without saying one word just looking at them with my eyes and having them personally escort me on the train, have the man refused entry while I boarded and been assured of my safety (this literally happened just last week - he was refused entry and they blocked him from entering my train, I tweeted my thanks here: https://twitter.com/MissSaxena_/status/486782406046023681).  I have been followed on the streets, chased in a car (with my mom driving), been in an almost empty stadium after a job interview and have a man follow me into the bathroom and peel my name tag off my shirt, as I said, more situations than I would care to speak of.

All I want to say is - Women look out for other women but I just don't see men doing the same.  I don't see men feeling that same responsibility, that same empathy and the empathy level drops very significantly if the woman in question has had alcohol.  Alcohol does not make a woman a target, alcohol is not a "no rules apply" situation.  The most drunken woman in the world can lie naked in front of a male member of my family and they would never be touched, they would be treated like a Queen; alcohol is not consent.

Whenever I am out, if I see someone that I think needs help, or may need my help I will NEVER leave them, they will not go out of my sight.  I will personally go out of my way to ensure that they are safe.  It may sound weird to you but I could never leave a situation where I think this girl or old man or whomever is alone, is in a dangerous situation and just leave.  Whatever the situation is, I will stay, I will say something, I will do it...why, because I can't look myself in the mirror if I left.  All I want, is for people to STAND UP.  It is YOUR RESPONSIBILITY.  It's your responsibility to help.  Don't be that douchebag that helps some guy hook up with a drunk girl.

Don't be that that person.  Please realize that it's your responsibility to watch out for someone, to make sure that no harm falls on them.

No one deserves to be violated.  No one deserves to be raped.  No one is asking for it.  No one.

Please do the right thing, be alert when you're out, and when you see something please, please don't be silent.  Call the police or if you won't be endangered speak out but whatever you do, do SOMETHING.