How Do You Say "Goddess Among Horny Boys" in Arabic?

So, with the fresh memory of a van full of avenge-lust men driving off after a smack-talking Israeli woman, I felt a little uncomfortable walking to and from school on Tuesday. This angst was further exacerbated after being told that my shoes look like “settler shoes” and my pants look like standard Israeli army issue. Great. On my return trip home, I found that perhaps my discomfort wasn’t completely unfounded. My usual route is a 25 minute walk along a busy two lane highway. As I was walking back to the house, a white van jumped the curb and drove up halfway onto the sidewalk a few yards in front of me. There are parallel parking spaces further up the road, so this was a peculiar place for the van to pull off the road. As I watched this new development unfold, I just wondered if there wasn’t a big fat bullseye painted on me.

In order to continue on my way, I needed to squeeze past the sliding passenger door of the van. My heart started to race as I approached. The windows were dark so it was difficult to assess how many people were in the van, but I was able to make out the outlines of at least three heads. Then, I tried to see if anything was reflected in the side-view mirror. If someone was going to jump out they would probably be watching me as I approached. I slowed my gait and reached into my bag to pull out the scissors that I use to cut up flashcards. If I was going to be grabbed, you better believe that someone was going to get stabbed in the neck for their troubles.

I walked flush along the wall as I approached the van. Slowly the passenger window started to roll down. I tightened my grip on the scissors and quickly scooted past the sliding door. Just then the guy in the passenger seat tried to say something. I’m not sure why, but my adrenaline plummeted. I just stopped next to the passenger door and asked in English: “Uh...What?” Again the passenger tried to say something, but instead of a making a sound, his mouth just moved. Now I peered into the van. There were three guys and it appeared that none of them could speak. One was laying on the backseat, bent over laughing. I just stood there, asking again in English “What?” and no doubt freaking them out. These characters were so HIGH they could barely open their eyes, let alone speak. I briefly flirted with the idea of doing my best psychedelic clown impersonation, but I decided to let the party people be. Poor little lambs. I give them credit for at least being able to get the van up on the sidewalk before they succumbed to their bong hit TKO. Keep truckin’ little dancin’ bears...keep truckin’.

It turns out that men in their twenties are not the ones I need to be concerned about. Their little brothers are far more threatening. There is something fundamentally wrong with a society when teenage boys grab at a foreigner’s crotch for kicks. You can’t blame the Occupation for this. The Israelis aren’t the reason that teenage boys are sexually repressed. This is simply about lack of respect for women. Nor can you pull the culture card by claiming that Western women are immodest and therefore are more titillating than a covered Muslim woman. That argument is nothing but bullshit. Jerusalem has attracted tourists and pilgrims from other lands from time immemorial. There is nothing particularly erotic about a tall dark-haired woman in loose fitting corduroys. I should know. I’ve worn these corduroys for years. Never before have I set the world off its axis by wearing these hippy dippy togs.

What this place needs is some sexual communication counseling STAT. The boys that are off running around in the streets have no means of discussing or expressing their sexual curiosity. Do they ever sit down with their fathers and discuss their urges and feelings. Or their mothers for that matter? Is it just through James Bond films and internet porn that they learn about sex? I am by no means Jenna Jameson, so I’m going to suggest that these kids are making quite an associational leap from porn star to me. Nevertheless, it was enough of a connection for them to want to grab at my crotch as I jumped into the road to avoid their advance.

What really sucks is that I have to walk past them everyday, and I doubt that they’ve gotten it all out of their system. When they came at me, I barked out a stern “Ayeb! Shu Hadda?” followed by a badass “Fuck Off!” followed again by a well poised middle finger as I called them “Little Assholes”. To round off the whole exchange, I made an attempt to ask “Don’t you have a mother?” which I believe I translated as: “Have you...I don’t have my mother with me!?” Ahhhh, touché! That’ll teach ‘em! I’ll have to practice a few solid zingers, and unleash them next time in consort with a sharp kick to the balls or box to the ears. Then it won’t matter if I mess up the translation. The problem is I’m not always good with thinking on my feet in Arabic. And when I say “I’m not always good”, I mean “not good at all”. Kind of like how when I was looking for the rest room at school and I thought I had asked the cleaning woman if the downstairs bathroom was OK to use. (it had previously been out of order) In actuality I had asked her “Is the weather good?” She just nodded, “Yes...yes...” As it turned out the downstairs bathroom was OK and the weather was good. Win-win. In any case, I think I might have to try walking on the other side of the highway until I learn to be more formidable than a pack of horny thirteen year old boys.