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May. 2nd, 2019 11:22 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
girlofpreyHad an...altercation? With a homeless man today. At least I assume he was homeless, maybe he was just a drunk. I was coming out of Leeds train station, and I saw a woman I often see there selling the Big Issue. An Asian woman, middle-aged, shorter than me, who wears a headscarf. A white man was leaning over her, obviously shouting at her, although I had my headphones in and couldn't hear what was being said. But she was gesturing for him to go away, and leaning back away from him, and frankly I could guess. So I took my headphones out. Watched for a moment. Then after a moment asked him - because he was the closest to me - if everything was all right. At which point I realised how drunk he was, because he could barely seem to focus on me and what I was saying. He asked me if I had any spare change. I said no and went to walk away, but looked back at the woman before I did to see if she was alright, and realised he was following me as I walked away. He asked me if I had any spare change again. Then it was my turn. He asked me where I was from. I told him I wasn't going to tell him that. He repeated the question, either trying to intimidate me by asking about where I lived or this was going to turn into a rant about England and immigrants. Little does he or anyone else know that despite how white I am, I'm actually quite recently descended from immigrants. I asked him why he wanted to know, and said I wasn't going to answer him, and said the same thing when he repeated the question. Then he looked me in the eyes and said "you're confident, aren't you?".
Then there were a few more questions. Where did I live? He mentioned that my hair was going grey already, and asked me how old I was. He held up his plastic bottle like a microphone, as though he was interviewing me. He wavered forward with his hand, and I told him not to touch me. He laughed repeated it back mockingly. Finally I said I was going to leave, because I had to get to work - a little nastily. He asked me where I worked. I said I wasn't going to tell him that and turned to walk away. And felt something on the back of my arm. He'd tapped me on the back of my arm with the bottle as I was going to walk away. So I turned back and asked him if he'd touched me. He smiled and said "yeah". I asked him again, did you just touch me, and he smiled and said "yeah". So I went back into the train station to go get the British Transport Police, because oh my God. As I went he started calling "no, I didn't, no, I didn't". But I wasn't fucking having it at that point. Unfortunately, the BTP I'd seen in the train station on the way out seemed to be dealing with another incident (???!!?), but I managed to speak to one officer and tell her roughly what had happened, and she said she'd go check it out. By the time I got back out there, the guy had gone, and the Big Issue woman gestured which way he'd gone off. It was a different direction from the way I was going off to work, so I just told her I'd spoken to the police, they might come out and ask her about it, and that I was really sorry for his behaviour, and then I left.
Except I didn't leave it just there, obviously - mentally, I mean. It was the last I saw of him, but I was still checking behind me all the way to work in case he was following me, and then when I left work I was tense about going through the same train station doors again, and then I was checking behind me all the way home. Because I am OCD and paranoid and anxious. And it's bullshit that people like that just think they can get their own way by intimidating you - like if they scare you, they can just keep doing what they're doing and you won't stop them or challenge them, and even if anyone comes to question them it's like "oh, well she didn't tell me to stop - she just backed off! I didn't know I was upsetting her." And it's bullshit that it kind of works, because it ruined my day, I was anxious and checking behind me for the rest of the day, and I'm sure he'd love that if he knew about it. I'm a little anxious about going through the train station again tomorrow, but it's got to be done. And the Big Issue woman can't exactly not be there, she has to be there to work. And it's just bullshit. I even know that he's too much of a coward, and either too drunk or possibly brain-damaged to do anything I wasn't aware of, but even so it's stressful. And I haven't spoken to anyone at work about it, or my parents, because I don't want to be kind of told I was more or less asking for it, and shouldn't have said anything.
But that makes two women in a week I've seen men just randomly yelling at in public, for whatever power trip or balm to their own low self-esteem they wanted. I can't tell if things are getting worse, in a society sense, or I just happen to have seen this stuff these particular times. But fuck.
Then there were a few more questions. Where did I live? He mentioned that my hair was going grey already, and asked me how old I was. He held up his plastic bottle like a microphone, as though he was interviewing me. He wavered forward with his hand, and I told him not to touch me. He laughed repeated it back mockingly. Finally I said I was going to leave, because I had to get to work - a little nastily. He asked me where I worked. I said I wasn't going to tell him that and turned to walk away. And felt something on the back of my arm. He'd tapped me on the back of my arm with the bottle as I was going to walk away. So I turned back and asked him if he'd touched me. He smiled and said "yeah". I asked him again, did you just touch me, and he smiled and said "yeah". So I went back into the train station to go get the British Transport Police, because oh my God. As I went he started calling "no, I didn't, no, I didn't". But I wasn't fucking having it at that point. Unfortunately, the BTP I'd seen in the train station on the way out seemed to be dealing with another incident (???!!?), but I managed to speak to one officer and tell her roughly what had happened, and she said she'd go check it out. By the time I got back out there, the guy had gone, and the Big Issue woman gestured which way he'd gone off. It was a different direction from the way I was going off to work, so I just told her I'd spoken to the police, they might come out and ask her about it, and that I was really sorry for his behaviour, and then I left.
Except I didn't leave it just there, obviously - mentally, I mean. It was the last I saw of him, but I was still checking behind me all the way to work in case he was following me, and then when I left work I was tense about going through the same train station doors again, and then I was checking behind me all the way home. Because I am OCD and paranoid and anxious. And it's bullshit that people like that just think they can get their own way by intimidating you - like if they scare you, they can just keep doing what they're doing and you won't stop them or challenge them, and even if anyone comes to question them it's like "oh, well she didn't tell me to stop - she just backed off! I didn't know I was upsetting her." And it's bullshit that it kind of works, because it ruined my day, I was anxious and checking behind me for the rest of the day, and I'm sure he'd love that if he knew about it. I'm a little anxious about going through the train station again tomorrow, but it's got to be done. And the Big Issue woman can't exactly not be there, she has to be there to work. And it's just bullshit. I even know that he's too much of a coward, and either too drunk or possibly brain-damaged to do anything I wasn't aware of, but even so it's stressful. And I haven't spoken to anyone at work about it, or my parents, because I don't want to be kind of told I was more or less asking for it, and shouldn't have said anything.
But that makes two women in a week I've seen men just randomly yelling at in public, for whatever power trip or balm to their own low self-esteem they wanted. I can't tell if things are getting worse, in a society sense, or I just happen to have seen this stuff these particular times. But fuck.
(no subject)
Date: 2019-05-03 01:39 pm (UTC)