From a Woman's Perspective: A Message about Consent

In 2008, I was walking to my apartment at night and a man approached me to ask for directions. I pointed where to go and he grabbed my butt. I said "sorry" and walked away. "Sorry". I did nothing wrong and I apologized to a guy who grabbed my butt, because it is ingrained in me, and in others, to be polite. "Sorry".

Does it matter that I was wearing a short skirt that night? Does it matter that I didn't wear a skirt for a month after that?

Last week on a crowded subway in Beijing at rush hour, someone grabbed my butt. I swatted the hand away. I share these two stories as a person who has encountered unwanted advances. It happens.

With #notallmen all over Twitter, and in light of this recent expose, I wanted to share a bit of my life experience, as well as some musings on the word "no".

For some of us, saying "no" is hard. Even when someone is doing something unwanted, the word "no" might come to mind, but the politeness and preservation of the happy mood might lead us to say everything but "no".

For this reason, it's clear that "no" isn't always a word. In fact, in my life, I've only ever used the word "no" in a physical situation once, despite having been in multiple scenarios where the word "no" would have been useful.

"No" doesn't have to be said. It can be a look of the eye, a turn of the shoulder, a nudge of the hand, a turn of the head; no comes in many colours.

It could be "I don't know" or "I have a boy/girlfriend" or "I'll be late" or "I'm tired" or anything else that isn't a bright smiling yes. All of these are the actions of a person who doesn't want the advance. It could be "sorry". If someone doesn't want to kiss you, they probably don't want to do anything else.

There's a big difference between touching someone who wants it, and touching someone who doesn't.

3 Surprisingly difficult things to find in Korea

 

Bras

For many women, shopping in Korea is a fashionably wonderful experience, where the clothes are cheap and fun to wear. Clothes are also available everywhere, with shirts and skirts for sale on streets and underground markets, as well as subway stations. If it’s easy to shop for clothes, how about bras? Buying a bra in Korea would be obviously impossible for a large-chested woman (since the biggest size of bra available there is about equal to a C-cup), but what about for a smaller-framed woman? Still impossible. I don’t know one non-Korean woman who can fit into a Korean bra. They are heavily padded, and tend to be very small around the ribcage. My friend Yoomi once told me that Korean bras are made for Korean women only. I'm still not sure if it's true, but Korean bras certainly don't fit me. So, if you're planning to be in Korea for a long time, it’s a good idea to bring your favourite selection of bras with you.

Not hard to find - a leopard print fuzzy case with tail for your smartphone

Tampons
 

After having a coffee with my friend Joo, we were walking in the street and we came to a special pharmacy in Korea called Olive Young. This is one of few stores where you can buy tampons in Korea, so I asked my friend if we could go inside. Once I found what I was looking for, Joo looked at what I had in my hand and was obviously shocked and uncomfortable. “Kerri, you use those??” She reacted as if I was buying illegal drugs. The concept of tampons hasn’t really caught on in Korea, yet, and most of my Korean friends don’t use them. For this reason, they can be hard to find. When you do find tampons, they are pretty much like the cardboard tampons of ten years ago – stripped of the modern flashy specialties offered in North America. Perhaps with a little pretty packaging and a Korean idol spokesperson, we can make tampons the next big thing for women in Korea.

Not hard to find - a hippie group of foreigners hanging in the grass

Deodorant
 

Do Asian people just win at the game of sweating? Do they just not have body odour? In my hot summer classroom without air conditioning, I’m wiping the sweat from my forehead while my students keep their spring jackets on. Even when they came into my class right after a volleyball game, they still don’t seem to smell. I don’t know how it works, but I somehow have never smelled B.O. from my Korean students or friends. Perhaps due to the lack of suffocating B.O., deodorant just has no place in the Korean drug store. Or perhaps everyone here has a secret to preventing B.O. that I’m just not in on yet. Either way, finding deodorant is a challenge, and like the tampons, when you find it, there isn’t much selection.

Not hard to find - cars parked everywhere and anywhere

Are there any items from home you haven't been able to find on your travels?