8 Comments
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Deren Sanıvar's avatar

Very few spoken experiences that I relate to so niche and deeply: [ I SEARCH THEIR EYES HOPING THAT THEY JOIN ME IN DOWNPLAYING THE ENCOUNTER ]. Awe Joseph. I feel for you, and deep. 🫶🏼

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George's avatar

Simple. These people come from underdeveloped countries and regime so for them this is totally normal. On your side you felt threatened because you knew in case he jumped on you you would not be able to do anything. Take some MMA classes and go to the gym

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Joseph Awuah-Darko's avatar

Discomfort is not correlated to an inability to defend oneself or any "weakness" you may be alluding to. Unfortunately I am fully capable in that department, but I still felt remarkably uneasy. Secondly, I am tragically well travelled and I come from a West African country in the "global south". There is not much difference between this nature of harassment by locals in more "developed / first world" countries whether its New York or Amsterdam. Wrong is wrong - regardless of the hemisphere. I am appreciate your comment.

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Joseph Awuah-Darko's avatar

Typo: I appreciate your comment.

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George's avatar

Can you elaborate regarding your capability of defending yourself? You possess self-defense weapons? If so are you trained to use them?

The Arab looking individual is not a local. I'm Greek and I can recognize that western northern people overall display much more civilized behavior regardless of the colar color of the job.

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Joseph Awuah-Darko's avatar

Two things : (a) Immigrants that have integrated are part of a local community (b) While I admire your curiosity, I do not share the entitlement you might have to knowledge of the specific ways I possess the capacity to defend myself. I feel we are both fairly intelligible with our words. If I *say I can defend myself that should be enough, respectfully. Will not be engaging further but I welcome further comments. Thanks again.

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George's avatar

Immigrants that have integrated are behaving like the rest thus the word integration. Western northeners are not behaving like this.

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Stacey Olendi's avatar

OMG! I'm so sorry for this experience. I remember when I was a teenager and people would catcall, or this one instance when my dad took me and my sister to a bar so he could get one for the road, and this way-older man started winking at me and it felt sexual. During those instances I used to ask myself if I did something to warrant that attention. Now I understand that there's no crime in looking fabulous, there are just "badly behaved" people. "Badly behaved" is in fact an overt understatement. Hugs.

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