14 year old girl

Olivia

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I was 14 years old when it happened. I was in a crowded ski lift when I noticed the man behind me was quite close to me. At first, I found it quite strange but then I thought I was getting paranoid. During the few minutes we were in the ski lift, I felt his hand brushing the back of legs, I tried to ignore it by scrolling through social media. When we got to the station, everyone got off the ski lift and I was ready to get off when I got pushed up against the lift. In that moment I realised I was being pinpointed by his two poles, I couldn’t move, I couldn’t scream, I couldn’t do anything. The only thing that was crossing my mind was a alert/instinct telling me GET OUT OF THIS SITUATION. So, I elbowed him, I could see what he looked like, he was a old man I would say in his 60s. I rushed out of the lift to get to my family who were waiting at the button lift. I hadn’t processed what had just happened. It was on my mind for a while. It took me a month to build up the courage to tell my mum. She brushed it off and told me it was nothing and that I shouldn’t worry about it. What really scares me is what would have had happened if I didn’t manage to get off that lift.

Solongo

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I was really happy, brave, active girl with lots of friends in school before I experienced sexual harassment. I live in Mongolia where sexual harassment is not taken seriously. I was 14 and I took a bus to meet my friends. The bus was quite crowded and I saw one thief going through one grandma’s purse from her back. I was really brave and I said to him to stop that (my heart was beating really fast then). That guy stopped but while he got out of the bus, he slided his hand between my legs…. I was really surprised I couldn’t even talk and stared at him shaking. That guy then smiled back (was the evilest smile I saw). Every people seating at the back of the bus saw the incident but they didn’t say anything. there were old people young people, female, male, kids, but none of them said anything. I got off from the bus and went home running and I cried all night. I was really disappointed to the adults especially. Since that terrifying incident, I don’t go out as often as I did, I don’t go alone, have stopped being active, have deleted all the strangers, friend’s friend on my social networks. I became a quiet girl. Whenever I go outside, I go with fear all the time.