Honestly, just save yourself the hassle.
I was having a bad day.
The kids at the kindergarten had exhausted me. I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life, but the realisation that teaching was not it was looming over me. I suddenly came face to face with an uncertain future. And this got me pretty stressed, and pretty down in the dumps.
After taking a walk along the harbour to clear my head, I was wandering back to my humble abode a few streets up the block. Bon Jovi was blaring through a pair of shitty 40HKD headphones, and my mind was a million miles away.
It was then that multiple car horns alerted me I had stepped out onto the highway without the accompaniment of a green man.
After narrowly avoiding a collision with a taxi driver on a mission (he was stopping for no one, let alone an entitled girl with a passion for jaywalking) I retreated back to the safety of the curb. The onsetting humility clashed with the backing music of ‘It’s My Life’.
I noticed that a man in a van was staring at me. He held my gaze as he drove on by. I sheepishly stood my ground on the pavement as I watched him pull his vehicle up a little further down the road. He was speaking to a stranger. It must be the person he was picking up.
Only slightly unsettled, I began making my way up the hundreds of steps that led to my home.
I suddenly found my focus drawn to my peripheries. Someone was trying to get my attention. Reluctantly, I pulled out an earphone, abandoning my Bon Jovi soundtrack.
The man from the van had followed me, and insisted that we must go on a date. If it weren’t for the fact I was donning a pair of sweatpants, a stained hoodie, and an old beanie, I might have been complimented by this level of attention.
After all, who doesn’t like a bit of male validation.
I reject the date, because this man is twice my age and I am not interested. I make up an excuse that I have just gotten out of a difficult break up, and am not ready to re-enter the dating scene. But this man is relentless, insisting we can go on a date as friends, and after unsuccessfully casting doubt on his intentions, I finally concede.
No, we can’t go on a date. But he can have my number if he wants.
It was really just a shot at a get out of jail free card.
WhatsApp foils my plan, because only a registered number can be added as a new contact. I reluctantly give this man my real number, and just commit to airing him later.
The solution to the problem, it seemed, was just to appease it and then ignore it later.
After multiple days of incessant messaging, I think the man finally gets the hint that I am not interested. I make sure to open his texts and leave them on read, just to really nail the message home.
It turns out that avoiding the problem doesn’t actually get rid of the problem. Especially if your problem has no inclination to go away.
Flash forward a few weeks later, I have again had a bad day at the kindergarten.
To be honest, most days at the kindergarten were bad days.
I want to get home and eat my 7-11 sandwich under the watchful gaze of my newest Netflix obsession.
Instead, I hear someone calling my name.
It is the man. Again.
He explains that I must not be getting his WhatsApp messages, because he has not received any replies. He has been driving his van around the neighbourhood for the past few weeks, in the hope that maybe he will run into me again. I honestly think he thought it sounded romantic.
And I was so pissed off.
How dare this man have the audacity to enter my turf, and make me feel uncomfortable there?
And for the first time in a very long time, I decided appeasement was not the solution to my problem. I do not like conflict. But it was clear to me that here, in these circumstances, conflict was necessary.
I turn around to face the man who has caused my problem, and curtly explain that I ignored his messages because I am not interested in pursing anything with him. I told him I didn’t want to speak to him, and I didn’t want to see him again.
And that is exactly what happened – I never saw him again.
Let me get one thing straight – I don’t actually think this man was malicious. He was weird – yes. And he clearly didn’t understand social boundaries. But I don’t think he was out to hurt me. He was just a person desperately looking for someone to love.
And whilst I prefer to focus on a person’s intentions, rather than the consequences of their actions, people with really good intentions can cause really harmful circumstances. It wasn’t my responsibility to make this random stranger feel good. Especially if this meant making myself uncomfortable, and sacrificing my own wellbeing.
I’m sure this man doesn’t like me very much. He probably thinks I’m an outright bitch. But if how I acted has made him think about the way he approaches people, then I’m not really bothered about the way I appear to him.
I am not the end of his self-awareness journey. Perhaps I was only the beginning. I will never know whether this man came to understand why his actions were reprehensible.
But I have hope that in standing up for myself, I’ve started a chain of events that transcended that one moment.
And even if it hasn’t, I can proudly say that:
No one gets in the middle of me and Bon Jovi.
Hands Open 