It is not walking distance for me
A man's words, in a man's world.
How to woman in Pakistan
My hotel is within walking distance away from the Coffee, Tea and Company café I love, but it’s within walking distance for men. If anyone saw me trotting along Hussain Chowk with my Freda Khalo purse and my leather laptop bag with my name engraved in gold, I’d either be followed, groped, or some shmuck would roll down his car window and yell RANDI at me.
That happened to me in Islamabad, the car rolled next to me as I was crossing the McDonald’s zebra crossing. It slowed down with the eeriness it could, the guy said, Mashallah in the most lecherous way one could. So I said, your mom, and he said, RANDI.
My younger teenage daughter was with me. She said she is going back indoors never to return again. Teenagers could think in extremes, but the sentiment is what matters.
The Pakistani constitution guarantees me and my daughters rights equal to men. Still, it reminds me of when slaves were emancipated in the American Civil War – free to do anything they want, but they had nothing to be free with. They had nothing to their name. No bed, no land, no crops, and many of them starved after they were set free by law. White supremacy, the cornerstone of American exceptionalism, was essentially hoping the black community would die off with chicken pox. What’s the point if they were brought in for labor and they no longer serve that purpose?
We are in the same boat, Pakistani women.
We can’t really be seen on the streets inhabiting public space or else, we will be taken or taken down.
No one will say this but there is a sense that women have too much freedom, and those like me who are done with children, are dispensable and will hopefully die off, leaving only the good women behind. The good women are the ensalvable ones. The quiet ones. We are oppressed because we are oppressable. The reverse martyr.
I’m not quiet. There is a storm inside me every day. Inside I want to stay confined and safe and indoors.
Outside, I step into the light so I can see a Pakistan that doesn’t exist, where men and women can actually live the constitution, without worrying how those who dish out power feel about it.
Walking distance is men’s walking distance.
The price of a product is what men want the price to be and what men can afford the price to be.
And as for poor men, and us women, we are the same, except that if they can they would oppress us too.
As long as there is a hierarchy of oppression that Audre Lorde talked about, there will be no equality for us women and trans people in Pakistan.
I took a Careem instead for a 30-second walk. The driver couldn’t believe that I sought a ride-hailing app a block away. Privilege can help you escape harassment and everyday sexism, but it only works sometimes.